November 30, 2018
”I came to the beach to find some magic.
My life felt chaotic and misguided, but there was always truth to be found where earth met sea. I looked out at the waves crashing on the rocks, trying to find a mermaid.
Yes, a mermaid.
Someone who would tell me magic is real and whisk me off on an underwater adventure. I imagined it would suddenly be hard to breathe, sitting there on the sand, and then my lungs would search for the ocean, find the salty sea water, and suddenly air, or water I suppose, would fill my body, and I wouldn’t be drowning anymore.
I stared out at the sea for a while longer, waiting for my mystical friend, even sang a beautiful song hoping she would hear me.
It was getting dark and I turned to leave, but a cliff off the paved pathway caught my eye, and I climbed it instead. After walking a while, I sat, with a new view of the water. From up high I had even more perspective on it. I closed my eyes and asked,
‘Am I fulfilling my purpose in life?’
The answer was muddled in my brain, which I took as a ‘no‘. I figured that of course I wasn’t, because once you’ve fully lived your purpose, that’s probably when you leave this life in the form of death. I concluded that I had asked the wrong question, closed my eyes again and asked,
‘Am I on the right path to fulfilling my destiny?’
I waited. Once again, the muddled confusion in my mind was a clear answer of ‘no.‘
That thought was very sad to me.
I want to fulfill what I was created to fulfill, and I know my confusion and misdirection as of late has been the cause of so much internal and external anxiety and depression.
Again, I closed my eyes and listened to the waves.
I wanted to know what I was missing, how I could get back on the path to my heart’s desire, my mission in this life. I tried my best to empty my mind of scattered thoughts, to make a clear way for inspiration to be received.
The answer came so quietly in my mind, I almost disregarded it... Like a long lost friend in the corner of the room who had been quieted for so long that they had become so small...
so small.
The voice said, ‘More silence.‘
More silence.
More silence. ...”
This is something I wrote after a solo beach trip over a year ago. I was just out clearing my mind and wrote this right before I left to head home. It might sound depressing, that’s what Nephi said, haha! But it wasn’t. For me, I realized that in every spare minute I had throughout the day, I was just filling it with more noise; tv, social media, people, music, places to go, to-do lists, etc... when what I really needed was more time in prayer, in meditation, in pondering if all these things I was doing were truly necessary or not... Spoiler alert, most of them weren’t. ;) Anyways, I was just going to post what I wrote and leave it up to interpretation, but when Nephi said it sounded really depressing, I thought I’d give a little context as to what it meant to me. I hope it means something to you!
Love, Beth