Beyond the Stagnant

Signs of movement

I am not where I’d hoped I’d be. The new semester has started and while I’m grateful for the stability of another semester’s salary, certainty, and health benefits (and to have a job at all teaching humanities in Higher Ed in the age of AI), this first week has stirred up unexpected sadness. 

For a few years now, I’ve hoped for something different. I’ve wondered if I could quit teaching and write a memoir or replace my teaching income with OCD coaching or copywriting. Signing the contract to teach two classes in the Linguistics Department at the local university felt like signing away that hope. 

I thought audacity would be enough. This last year, I had the audacity to try coaching, to get back into submitting my writing, and to teach at a new campus in hopes of finding a new permutation of my career that I love. 

I’ve put my dreams out there, but the income hasn’t followed. Progress can be slow, quiet, small as well. 

At the lake by my house, a breeze drifts by the water’s edge. My eyes are drawn to the stagnant layer of brown-green algae fanning out across the surface of the water at one end.

I could focus here: on the dark, murky, stagnant. And I do for a moment. 

Birds chirp and I feel a cool breeze on my skin even though the algaed-section of the water remains still. 

I feel it before I see it: a sign of life and movement.  

I look up and past the murky edge and see ripples blow across the water in the center of the lake. Ducks dip their bills in search of food, birds swoop and sing. 

All is not still.

I’ve felt so much movement even if my job title doesn’t show it: a daily writing practice, mental healing, deepening relationships, and growing trust in myself and my ability to take risks.

Here at the water’s edge, I see beyond the stagnant to a bigger picture. A cool breeze comforts, if I let it. 

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I’d love to hear from you! What is one area of your life that feels stagnant? If you look up or zoom out, can you see a bigger picture?