Learning to Walk in the Dark
On Saturday night, I told myself: If I wake up early on Sunday, I’m going to head over to the water and sit with Mother Nature to see what she has for me. So the next morning, I found myself up at 6:30 AM and out the door by 7:00.
I initially planned to head to a beach 15 miles south because I love watching pelicans glide across the water and wanted a guaranteed sighting. However, my rental car had a tire pressure issue on the drive down, so I scrapped that plan and ended up at a pier just eight miles away.
When I arrived, it was as quiet and serene as expected. The cool morning air after a night of showers had enticed just a few runners, elderly folks walking their dogs, fishermen, and a lot of pigeons courting one another. I walked to the east end of the pier and gazed out, asking the universe for the dolphins to appear.
As I started my Reiki Hara breathing, a beautiful juvenile seagull landed on the railing just a few meters away. We locked eyes for a moment before I returned my focus to my breath. Out of the corner of my eye, I noticed the bird stepping closer and closer, until it was just a couple of feet away. We gazed at each other again before it took off toward an aerial quarrel between two other seagulls out over the water. It seemed to fly over specifically to break up the fight, as the two battling gulls quickly scattered in opposite directions. The juvenile then returned to the railing just a short distance north of me.
As it landed, it stared at me and started calling, so I walked over. We stood a safe distance apart, enjoying the view, before it flew back out into the ocean, heading north to join another group of seagulls circling above the water. As I watched it blend into the flock, I spotted a small dolphin pod just beneath them: a few adults and a couple of calves surfacing discreetly, just enough for their fins to cut through the surface. That seagull had helped fulfill my wish, redirecting my attention to what I otherwise would have missed.
Usually, when I spot a dolphin pod (which is maybe 25% of the time), they stay quite far out. But this time, I asked out loud if they could swim closer. After about 10 minutes, the pod turned toward the pier and swam right past us, stopping everyone in their tracks to record the moment.
I couldn’t help but smile and feel so loved by the universe, Mother Nature’s creatures, and my growing connection with the local seagull community. The seagulls have been my biggest supporters, providing wisdom and physical protection, especially during delicate moments of my awakening.
Following the beach, I drove to a gas station to pump air into my tires and top off my gas tank so I could return my rental car later that morning. While waiting in line for a pump, I noticed an elderly woman in front of me preparing to drive off with her gas cap and door wide open. I hopped out of my car and waved to catch her attention, securing her gas tank just as she began to pull away. The driver in front looked over with an expression of relief. For someone who rarely drives these days, it felt grounding to be in the right place at the right time to lend a hand. I seem to find myself in those exact situations sometimes whenever I’m at a gas station, which got me thinking about how often we move through life too distracted to be present, always in a hurry to get to the next thing. I know I’m guilty of it, too.
That helpful momentum carried through the rest of the day in a series of thoughtful interactions with strangers, leading me to finish out the day with a walk through my favorite nearby garden. I love its dense vegetation, massive trees, wildlife, and koi pond, which always reminds me of the lush landscapes of my hometown.
I was initially disappointed that the previous night’s rain left the pond a bit too murky for me to see the fish, but moments later, the situation took an unexpected turn when two men walked up. One of them stepped onto a stone in the pond, crouched down, and placed his hand in the water, gently waving it around to draw all of the large koi fish to the surface. It was a beautiful scene to witness, and for nearly twenty minutes, he stayed there interacting with them. I was mesmerized by the exchange, leaving me to wonder how often we allow ourselves as adults to slow down, connect with the natural world, and embrace the simple curiosity of our inner child.
When I review my day, from the quiet stillness of the pier to the unexpected moments along the way, I’m in awe. My weekends have become so calm, peaceful, and spontaneous. I couldn’t believe the person I had become in that moment, and how much my perspective has expanded over just two short years.
Get Reframing Minds’s stories in your inbox
Join Medium for free to get updates from this writer.
This time two years ago, I was nursing the sting of two very different situations. The first was a situation I stubbornly stayed in seven years too long, until Source gave me an ultimatum: either leave, or let it end my life. The second was the abrupt end of an unexpected connection that felt like destiny, leaving me unable to figure out the logic behind why it stung so deeply. Both haunted me far longer than I wanted to admit. And back then, while in the thick of dating, I remember telling people I wanted to move overseas after 2028. I was someone who was so fixated on mapping out every detail of the future.
This time last year, I was in the most perplexing phase of my life, anxiously combing through past events, dissecting the people I had encountered, and chasing gut feelings, synchronicities, and curiosities in search of answers to a growing number of riddles that defied logic and modern science. I reached out to spiritual mentors and teachers across the country for insight into those moments of confusion. Yet after all that effort, I was left with no clear answers, only more puzzles.
Today, my mind and nervous system feel completely different from where they were one and two years ago. I feel far more confident in understanding why my search for mentors never panned out the way I envisioned. Searching for external answers was like looking for a cheat sheet for a test I was meant to experience firsthand. My journey was designed to walk through this life blindfolded, with my hands tied behind my back, learning to navigate the dark step by step, and trusting answers that surface in solitude.
As I build my path ahead pebble by pebble, life has taught me to stop trying to figure everything out all at once or peek around the corner. Every time I try to micro-manage my path and its outcome, it strays, yet the most rewarding moments are rarely the ones that go according to plan.
Just recently, after a month of energetic molting where I was forced to rest, barely having the strength for the ten-minute walk to work, let alone getting through the workday, I finally got my rhythm back. I built myself back up over three weeks to working out four or five times a week, and I was feeling great. Then on Monday morning, I woke up in pain, realizing I tweaked my neck and shoulder in the middle of the night. My chiropractor fixed me within the day, but prescribed three to five days of zero exercise. I surrendered and canceled my workout classes. But by Wednesday, I felt so great, I said out loud, “I think I feel good enough to go to Lagree tomorrow.”
But thirty minutes later, stepping out of the shower, I stubbed my big toe on the door railing at the exact angle needed to crack off a third of the nail. Standing there with another bloody toe, worse than my first jiu-jitsu class last year, I laughed, looked up, and said to Source, “Okay, I get the hint. No Lagree tomorrow.” And just in case I tried to be slick and squeeze in an alternate form of exercise after a few more days, my period arrived a full week early, accompanied by another wave of spiritual sweats the following day. The message was unmistakable: Source was reminding me, and my body was asking for genuine rest, not forced productivity.
So this weekend, I just rested, despite my original plans to return to the bouldering wall after a long hiatus that started in August 2025, when I was in the thick of my awakening and feeling physically unbalanced every day.
And today I realized just how strong-willed (or stubborn) I really am. I thought, “If I can’t do most of my workouts that require feet and toe strength, like bouldering, Lagree, and yoga, maybe I can just focus on my upper body and do a few pull-ups or chin-ups.”
That didn’t go over too well. I ended up tweaking the other side of my neck and shoulder on my third pull-up, landing right back in my chiropractor’s office just a couple hours later. He and I were both laughing at how Source has had to strong-arm me in many creative ways to humble my ego. My mom always joked that I should’ve been a lawyer since I like to find loopholes in situations; I’d like to think I missed my calling as a scientist or engineer since I love tinkering, experimenting, and methodically — or impulsively — pushing my boundaries and skills to see what happens.
My ego demands to control every outcome, plan too far ahead, or grip onto rigid milestones like moving overseas after 2028. But I’m noticing how much more magical and fulfilling life can be when I just let go and leave room for flow, working toward broad themes and goals without holding onto rigid expectations.
Source has a life designed for me, far greater and more beautiful than anything I could imagine for myself. It reminds me of being a kid dreaming up an exact life path with barely any understanding of the world, only to realize later that there are countless, unimagined ways to truly live and enjoy this life. So with time, I’ve expanded my definition of surrender, allowing life to lead me where I need to be, exposing me to the lessons and people that foster real growth.
In romance, too, I know that whoever he is, he will mirror that same energy. Because true connection means finding a partner whose presence feels safe enough for me to surrender and be led, sharing leadership and mutual care, where both people hold each other’s best interests at heart.
