Paddle boarding on the river was a magical renewal. I looked forward to going back, and was excited to be in the kayak together, giving us a similar, but different experience from the first time we’d gone. Peter and I had kayaked together before at Kualoa Ranch’s secret island where we saw our first sea turtle. It had been ok, just the boundaries were smaller than we wanted, so we were happy to have more space to travel. I don’t know what happened from one day to the next, but we lost our groove. We would start traveling forward and end up going in circles very quickly. I was told I wasn’t doing my job, steering from the back. I said we hadn’t had a problem before when he’d been in the back, so we tried switching spots. Both of us were frustrated. I was cussing under my breath. None of it helped to get us traveling in a semi-straight line. Peter was digging in with such strength I couldn’t match the power he had, so we would go in circles. We ended up having to take turns for a bit until we both saw we could go straight with just one of us and Peter realized he was paddling much harder than he had at the Secret Island.
It made me think of a few life lessons that can be learned from this.
1: Being equally yoked only goes so far, you need to be able to match each other’s strength and work as a team. If one person is pulling the other one, basically dragging the other around, you won’t get anywhere. The strength from one person will cause you to go in circles. When Peter matched my strength, we were able to go forward. Maybe it wasn’t as quick as it could have been if I could match Peter’s strength, but it was much better than going in circles. Boyd K. Packer gave a talk that spoke of this as well. This video link is a visual reminder of how important teamwork is. https://www.churchofjesuschrist.org/media/video/2013-10-1111-equally-yoked-together?lang=eng
2: This experience began out far less than dreamy and magical, like my experience paddle boarding had been. I am sure my expectations for what would happen didn’t aid my patience for where our watercraft went in the beginning. I imagined us gliding peacefully through the water, encountering sea turtles and both being renewed at the end. Instead, we were pulling donuts in the water like someone learning to drive in the snow. I didn’t help our team by entering the experience with my head full of lofty expectations.
3: Just because this experience started out crummy didn’t mean it couldn’t be salvaged and turned around. We could have stopped in the beginning, given up, and ended our kayaking adventure with a sour note. Once we switched positions, took turns paddling to get the feel of it, and communicated more effectively we were able to move forward. It also helped us to calm down, enjoy our surroundings and see more sea turtles. We were there later in the day, not knowing the sea turtles would be more active. We saw many more turtles than we had the day before, as well as some manta-rays. We had another turtle come up to our kayak and say, “Hi,” to us. This time I just said, “Hi,” back, enjoyed the experience and didn’t worry about taking a picture.
4: Communication is essential. We were both blaming the other person for going in circles, we hadn’t had issues at Kualoa Bay, why were we having issues now?! It had to be the other paddler! Off with his/her head! Usually when we are frustrated with each other we leave the situation and come back so we can talk it through, you can’t really do that in a kayak. We needed to figure out the issue right then so that we could salvage what was happening. We were able to talk about what was going on, why things weren’t going as smoothly as the day before and figure out how to solve it. I know not all issues are resolved that quickly, but whatever the issue, honest and open communication will help when both parties are invested in the resolution.
5: You don’t always know your own strength, especially when it is matched against someone else’s weakness. I am not a wimp, though I am not in the best shape I have ever been, but my arms are not my greatest strength. When doing comparisons our weakness against someone else’s strength we go in circles. There is absolutely no way you’ll be able to progress when what you do is create a situation where you will automatically lose by pitting your weakness against their strength. It isn’t fair to you, nor to the other person.
6: I like paddle boarding much more than kayaking. This lesson is more for me than anyone else. I am glad that I got to kayak with Peter, I learned more about us as a couple. I love Peter dearly, but we have a much different approach to paddle
boarding, kayaking and watching sea turtles. Peter is much more patient about things, I like to keep moving. I wouldn’t have seen the manta-rays without Peter’s approach though, so learning balance with various methods is good for me.
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