“You’ll never know the opportunities that exist on the sea, if you stay on the shore.”
My good friend, Brian Johnston, said those words to me as I contemplated a big life and career shift nearly five years ago.
I had a great job. Wonderful colleagues. Terrific clients. Could have kept climbing a few rungs on the ladder every few years. It was and would have continued being great.
But the sea was calling me.
And I was terrified of its waters.
See, I’d been shipwrecked by them just a few years before he’d given me this advice. Broken and battered by the winds, and washed back up on the very shore I thought I was leaving.
But the sea kept calling, you know that little voice that lovingly haunts you as you fall asleep? Or the whisper that you can’t shake when you get out of emails and slack and texts?
I think we all have that stirring, where the deep waters start to swirl, and call us into something different. Something more meaningful. Something more purposeful.
Where do you need to cut the lifeline to the shore? Where do you need to push off from the dock? Where can you untether?
Fearfully, of course.
But trust, hope, love, and a little movement seem to be what is needed for the journey when it’s stormy, or smooth sailing…
