Momentous

I was never an overachiever.  In most realms, I didn’t like to challenge myself.  In high school, I took AP classes but never took the exams to get the actual college credits.  In college, I baffled some of my gen ed professors because I preferred to take classes below my skill level rather than test out.  I don’t know why I was that way, it’s just something I recognize now as a personality quirk. While I’m still not exactly an overachiever, I no longer shy away from challenges.

Learning to roll a whitewater kayak has been the most frustrating thing I’ve tried to do in a long time.  I mean, tears, nervous stomach. I would get it and lose it and get it and lose it.  And this was just in a nice warm, safe, flat pool.  Every time I flipped over in a river, I just popped out of my boat and swam before I could even think about rolling back over.  This, of course, was made entirely more frustrating because Jason, who began in exactly the same place as me, progressed much quicker.  I watched him hit every roll in the pool in any boat he got in.  I was proud and happy for him, but let’s be honest: it increased my frustration that I just wasn’t getting it.

And then came Sunday.  We finally went to the extremely intimidating and challenging whitewater center so I could demo a different kayak than the one I’ve been paddling.  I flipped over in virtually the very first rapid and lo! I rolled right back up!  Oh! The momentous feeling of surprise and glory that overcame me will be difficult to forget.  I rolled my kayak up in a rapid!

Life seems to be all about moments. “That moment when…”  Our memories of these moments are essentially all we have.  What I’ve learned from life and specifically from whitewater kayaking is that if you never step out of your comfort zone, if you never try something new (knowing you’re going to be terrible at it in the beginning or for maybe longer than you’d like), if you never experience frustration and fear and try it anyway, you never get to experience this moment of glory and joy when you finally succeed.  It’s heady, that moment, and I will no longer trade it for the comfort zone.

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