Making Room for Fresh Water

A few thoughts worth noting this weekend...

Yesterday offered an endless list of things that didn't go right.

A tree fell in a windstorm.

A tenant broke a garage door.

My team lost.

The table reservation wasn't ideal.

You could make quite a list from yesterday alone.

And yet, somehow, the cup overflows.

I've noticed that one of the great challenges of being human is that the psyche rarely remains empty. It is always being filled with something. The question is not whether it is full, but what it is full of.

If we do not intentionally create space for fresh water to enter our lives each day, the psyche slowly fills with something else. Resentments. Grievances. Comparisons. Fear. Separation. The running tally of everything that failed to meet our expectations.

And before long, we begin to believe that tally is reality itself.

But perhaps reality is much larger.

Perhaps the practice of stillness, gratitude, prayer, contemplation, walking, listening, noticing, and paying attention is less about escaping life and more about seeing it clearly.

The fresh water reminds us that life is rarely one thing.

Joy and sorrow arrive together.

Beauty and disappointment often sit at the same table.

The light enters through the cracks.

The saints and sinners share the same communion.

Night emerges from the day and disappears back into it.

The very things that seem opposed are often secretly informing one another.

Without fresh water in the psyche, paradox feels unbearable. We spend our days trying to decide whether life is good or bad, whether we are winning or losing, whether things are working or falling apart.

But with fresh water present, something shifts.

We begin to understand that life is not asking us to choose one side of the paradox. It is inviting us to hold both.

To acknowledge the fallen tree and the overflowing cup.

To grieve what is broken and celebrate what is beautiful.

To notice what didn't go right without forgetting all that has been given.

At some point, maturity may simply be realizing that every day contains both.

And perhaps wisdom is trusting that it all belongs.

So this weekend, find some way to let fresh water enter.

Sit quietly for ten minutes.

Watch the sunrise.

Take a walk without headphones.

Write down three things you're grateful for.

Listen carefully to someone you love.

Pay attention.

The world is still full of beauty.

And the cup, despite everything, still overflows.

— Ashton