Into No-Man’s Land

What is it about venturing into unknown territory that fascinates and terrifies us? Though the known world is fairly well mapped at this point in time, there is still so much we don’t know; so much yet to discover. We take exotic vacations—safaris, climbing expeditions—to see and experience new things we have never seen or done before. And why? Human curiosity is certainly on a wide spectrum, ranging from those who rarely leave hearth and home, to those who have traversed the globe multiple times. Each day, we are faced with new challenges, new people, new ideas, and our knowledge, patience, and kindness is tested in different ways. And why? Because it is in being tested that we grow. Franklin D. Roosevelt said, ‘A smooth sea never made a skilled sailor,’ and it is quite true. Always staying in the harbor, in fair weather will certainly guarantee you can handle a boat in one way. But by leaving the harbor, leaving the safety, the guaranteed path, is where we learn the most, and critically, how we handle adversity and turmoil.

The Stoic philosophy urges us to ask whether things that happen in our lives are in our control. That is, can we control the action or outcome of something ourselves. If the answer is yes, we are urged to make the best decisions we can and deal with the repercussions regardless. If it is not in our control, then we must endure it as best we can, and keep moving through life. Occasionally when swimming, we might find ourselves in deeper water than we expected to be in, perhaps pulled in that direction by wind or tides. Our feet no longer touch the bottom. What then? If we have been taught to swim, we might begin swimming in the direction we know to be safer, where we can touch the bottom again, just to give ourselves that feeling of safety. And for non-swimmers? Depending on the person, they might realize they can, indeed, float with their head above water, and perhaps try to call out to someone nearby for help getting back to the shore. In either case, though we might have been able to prevent ourselves from being in this situation—in our control—life presents us with situations we simply have to figure out what to do in the moment, using everything we have, not to panic, and to believe that we can do more than we might have thought possible. And these experiences stay with us the next time we are in a similar situation, and we are able to draw on them—though they were hardly fun to learn sometimes—to guide us to a higher place still: building on the lessons we learned there.

It is in controlling what you are able to control—especially as it concerns your reactions to things that happen—and allowing those uncontrollable situations to be your teachers that not only brings knowledge, but helps us become more confident in ourselves, and of how we move through the world. It also enables us to become teachers ourselves, guiding those around us through deep water, or steep mountains, to share our knowledge and to enable others to share theirs as well.