GOOD LIFE — ADRIFT

Drifting Aimlessly — A “How To” Guide

When the going gets tough, the truly tough … wander?

Not knowing what to do next can be tough … and extremely valuable.

When the going gets tough, the tough get going. That’s the common wisdom.

Sage advice and a theme often repeated in various forms.

I get it. Sometimes circumstances just call for pressing on in the face of adversity or sudden life change or crisis.

But, not always …

Sometimes the right move under difficult circumstances is simply to drift while pondering options.

That can be tough to do, particularly after a lifetime of clear direction and decidedly NOT drifting. I suspect, that like me, that’s more your style.

Joy, Solutions & Discovery

These three benefits of wandering or drifting resonate most powerfully with me. You may have your own list … if you’re still with me on this little journey.

I could expand my tally, but I’ll keep it focused.

Joy

We rolled on our 2-year-old’s schedule.

My wife, my 2-year-old son, Shawn, and I decided to take a two-week car trip along the California coast.

My wife and I decided really, but Shawn got to call the tune. We’d drive, but he’d tell us when to stop — to pee, to eat, to sleep, to play, to see something interesting, whatever.

The result — pure joy!

Without the pressures of an adult agenda we all just relaxed and enjoyed.

It’s amazing what a toddler can teach you if you listen to the lessons.

Knowing he was in control, Shawn rarely fussed. He just let his needs be known, and they became our needs.

I’ll repeat — pure joy resulted.

We meandered up the coast from LA to … I don’t even know where we ended up, but it was magical. Rarely in my adult life had I played so much, laughed so much, lived and loved it so much.

Joy found … heeding the near-random dictates of our little man who showed us how to slow down, discover and appreciate wandering.

Solutions

“Not all those who wander are lost.” — J.R.R. Tolkien

We’ve all had this experience.

You fall asleep with a seemingly unsolvable problem niggling your mind only to awaken with the solution right before you.

Plot twists, editing, arguments, dilemmas, self-doubts, and all kinds of other issues just sort themselves out while we’re blissfully unaware.

The same phenomenon can occur while we’re blissfully aware.

In 1978, I relinquished the management of my thriving rock-n-roll booking agency to a friend and went to Europe for the summer.

My business partner and I were happy with how our enterprise was performing but unhappy with how we were spending our lives. Neither one of us was convinced that our innate talents were being fully realized. Frankly, we didn’t even know what our “talents” were.

One hundred days spent roaming, thinking vaguely, for the most part, talking, drifting, lots of drifting, seeing great sights, smoking pot and hanging out produced the solution, even better than a Rip Van Winkle-style 100-day slumber would have.

I came home to re-enroll in college and pursue a medical career. My business partner became an architect.

Would the same result occurred had we stayed home running our business? Who knows? We can’t go down that path and find out. But wandering idly, vacationing, drifting, led us to what became our lives’ passions.

Discovery

I’ve written a bit about discovering the “extraordinary” in the “ordinary” of everyday routine.

This is slightly different.

Remember summer vacations as a kid? You learned how to swim, or skateboard, or you became a lifeguard, or practiced (or started) kissing, or you got your first job, or you went to camp, or saw Yosemite for the first time, or, or, or. A million “or’s” were possible because time stretched on without end before you.

After 33 years in the Emergency Medicine trenches I took a long break recently and went to Kerikeri, New Zealand in the rural far north of the North Island to work on a farm. The details of the experience are too much to relate here, but I made some important discoveries.

• Physical labor can be a bitch, and a thrill. Both most days.
• Total strangers will open their hearts and minds to you if you’re willing.
• Medicine is cool, but so is backyard chilling, sweaty, spent and satisfied after a hard day’s work.
• Living a different life after living the one I had lived was great.
• I missed plenty about my life back home … well yeah, not so much!

All I had to do was release myself into the unknown and take my direction from the farm experience and the people running it.

“Tell me what you want me to do, and I’ll do it” became my mantra, daily. In short, I relinquished control and drifted. Discoveries abounded.

Here’s my bottom line … try it.

There’s no time like the present. Just drift and see what happens.

Be careful though.

Joys, solutions and discoveries may occur without warning.

Wiser minds than mine, and pithier writers, helped inspire this essay. It wouldn’t be right to overlook the joys, solutions and discoveries they provided as I cobbled my thoughts together here.

“Sometimes when you lose your way, you find YOURSELF.” ― Mandy Hale, The Single Woman: Life, Love, and a Dash of Sass

“I wandered everywhere, through cities and countries wide. And everywhere I went, the world was on my side.” ― Roman Payne, Rooftop Soliloquy

“Sometimes it takes a wrong turn to get you to the right place.” ― Mandy Hale, The Single Woman: Life, Love, and a Dash of Sass

“Have we ever thought that being lost is our destination?” ― Craig D. Lounsbrough

“The feeling of homelessness suddenly turned into something else. I called it freedom to wander.” ― Meara O’Hara, The Wanderess and her Suitcase

“My ideal journey: set out early and never arrive.” ― Marty Rubin

“You may keep wandering in life all the time but one day life will take you to the place where you are meant to be!” ― Avijeet Das

“Life is less about finding and more about seeking.” ― Seth Adam Smith, Rip Van Winkle and the Pumpkin Lantern

“I had no goals, no ambitions. That left me free to wander and amuse myself.” ― Marty Rubin

“The world has become lovelier. I am alone, and I don’t suffer from my loneliness. I don’t want life to be anything other than what it is. I am ready to let myself be baked in the sun till I am done. I am eager to ripen. I am ready to die, ready to be born again. The world has become lovelier.” ― Hermann Hesse

“There is no sweeter pleasure than wandering aimlessly about.” ― Marty Rubin

“May your trails be crooked, winding, lonesome, dangerous, leading to the most amazing view.” ― Edward Abbey