A True Story churned up by Seth G
I stood in front of the Bintan Island beach, looking at the surf coming in from the Riau Islands and thought to myself:
Let’s Go! It’s just a metre high wave!
Famous last words as they would say. I got hit by a rip tide within 30 seconds of entering the water.
Youthful exuberance with little knowledge dictated that I struggled and fought the wave harder and exhausted myself.
After fighting the wave for a minute, that seemed like eternity, and being spun like a washing machine.
I had no energy to continue, and unlike Mr Krabs, the last few moments of conciousness is actually crystal clear vision and everything moves into slow motion before blacking out ..
Recently, Seth Godin wrote a piece — When You’re over your head, about Deep Water and Waves. Amusingly, he used the example of swells in the Indonesian Archipelago (exactly where I was!).
You might wonder why I jumped into the wave without any preparation
Well, at that time, I was at the peak of my fitness, and was a scuba rescue certified diver and swam alot. I figured, what can a metre high wave do.
It was a classic situation of mistaking Deep Water with Big Swells. Like Literally.
Thus, Seth’s post really resonated and I do my best to remember that when I am facing a problem in front.
Is it Deep Water where I should ignore the Depth or is it a Big Swell that I need coaching with.
Inversely, it gives us confidence when the challenge in front of us is really a Deep Water challenge, which is psychological.
Example: Public Speaking to 50 people and then to 500 people is a Deep Water problem. Speaking to Rally an Electorate to vote for you is probably a Big Swell challenge!
Here’s a handy pic (made with my poor Photoshop Mix skills) …
For those wondering if I made it through (or it’s a Ghost writer here), well I did. But as with all stories, it had a twist.
The lifeguards from that Resort (which I shall not name), were unable to swim past the surf to come out to us. Thankfully, an American family were chillin out by the beach and they jumped in to pull us out. For that I am eternally grateful. Literally.
P.s.: No. the Red Flags were not up that morning.
w | I pen my tongue-in-cheek musings on digital, data, crypto, life and how I fantasise I would build my SME in this Digital 4.0 world.