We are all appreciating family time in abundance now. It is the most fantastic side of this crisis, and everyone I know is appreciating it. Its been a crazy busy week of online training too and Saturday is officially my day off.
I love watching sport on Saturdays and I don’t watch much other TV, but now that’s no longer an option, I was stuck between having re-runs of Hart to Hart (a 70’s sort of millionaire detective “classic” in many people’s eyes) or Escape to the country (a pretentious show with a couple with a 800k budget who get offered a kitchen the sign of a sports hall and says “i don’t know it’s big enough”, and NEVER end up buying anything.
The offer of our daily walk/run/exercise couldn’t come quick enough.
If watching TV all the day is retirement, then you can see how many people get depression from losing their purpose in life just from that.
The build up tension of staying inside all day can easily make you explode.
The low energy irritability of watching rubbish TV was starting to get replaced with hope once I started walking down the harbour. The tension pains in my head of potentially watching back to back Hart to Hart were starting to ease.
The more I walked, the more my family ran in front of me, the more I had to run and it brought me some soothing feeling in my body, and my hope was coming back. I have done many training sessions down the harbour, and it’s one of my “happy” places that always lifts me up.
When I hit the sand, familiar feelings of activity came through me. Then I saw the river on the beach, tide was half in or out, I can’t really remember.
What I did remember though was looking at that river, and seeing it in its true grandeur.
That view had been there as long as I could remember, it was soothing, it was here in my childhood every day each summer, it must have been here for centuries, and in a time when most of us are thinking of the dreaded virus, that view offered me hope again after an hour of TV starting to suck the life out of me.
The river was bigger and better than any virus. This virus wouldn’t affect it, the river wouldn’t even notice or think about the virus, it was too big in nature to worry about such little human problems.
The river got me thinking bigger again, an hour of TV had depleted me, it had brought a lack of ambition into my mind temporarily, I couldn’t stand it and couldn’t wait to train hard tomorrow.
When I turned to walk back and saw the river from another angle, the sun shone brightly on it. It reminded me of good times are coming, but there was a remarkable stillness around.
The stillness reminded me that we are still in dark times, but it’s up to us to shine a light through it by being positive, being strong with our exercise and the food we put into us, and staying very hopeful for the future to come.
All bad things pass, I sincerely hope we appreciate our harbour in burry port even more and we keep these thoughts of the truly simple things mattering that much more in our thoughts and lives.
Some look for 2-7 holiday a year, or a big house or a big new car to find happiness, but never find it.
Life and happiness is never about having “things”, it’s about finding the meaning of life that I found in that river today, the pleasure and great head space and calmness it brings to everyone who walks on it.
It showed me that it was bigger than anything going on right now, nothing will stop it, and it was a clear sign that all bad stuff will wash away in the end.
The people we care for most are the biggest things, the ones that make us happy, and making sure we live as healthy as possible gives us the greatest possible chance of enjoying all of these wonderful and life-changing things.
Stay safe, stay positive, great times will come again.
