Today I Choose to be Flowing – How to be Flowing

When Curtis first took me fishing, I made it my mission to liberate the bait. Every worm, every shrimp, every innocent minnow—I’d secretly release them when he wasn’t looking, whispering tiny apologies as they swam to freedom.

Fishing wasn’t my thing. The smell of bait made me gag. The sun was too hot. The boat rocked too much. The whole enterprise seemed designed to bore me while torturing innocent sea creatures.

But this was his passion, his joy, his meditation. And I wanted to share in it. Or at least I wanted to want to share in it.

The Resistance Before the Flow

That first trip to the Keys, I was miserable. Arms crossed like an angry teenager, slathered in SPF 100, checking work emails on my phone, calculating hours until we could leave. I’d brought three books, my laptop, and enough snacks to survive a siege—anything to avoid actually fishing.

Curtis was in heaven. His whole body relaxed the moment we left the dock. His face lit up with every cast. He moved around the boat with the grace of someone completely at home.

I sat there like a hostage in paradise, radiating resentment.

“Just try casting once,” he said.

“I’m good,” I lied, gripping my book like a shield.

Then something shifted. Maybe it was the dolphins that appeared portside, playing in our wake. Maybe it was Curtis’s pure joy, so infectious I couldn’t maintain my resistance. Maybe it was exhaustion from being angry in such a beautiful place.

But I decided to stop fighting the experience and start flowing with it.

Learning the Current

“Teach me,” I said, surprising us both.

Curtis’s face transformed. In twenty years together, I’d never seen him quite that delighted. He taught me to read the water—how birds diving meant bait fish below, how current lines held predators, how structure created habitat.

I asked questions. “Why do you cast there?” “How do you know when to set the hook?” “What’s that bird doing?” “Why does the water change color there?”

Slowly, fishing revealed itself as more than catching fish. It was rhythm. Patience. Hope. Connection. Nature. Meditation with a chance of dinner.

I learned to celebrate every catch with a hundred photos, even the tiny ones that Curtis called “bait.” I learned to enjoy the waiting—the anticipation between casts. I learned to read his body language, knowing when he sensed fish before catching them.

And yes—I even learned to haul up some big ones myself.

The Compromise in the Current

I still can’t eat what I catch. Once I’ve met them, we’re bonded. I name them, thank them, photograph them, and release most of them with an apology for the inconvenience. Curtis rolls his eyes but loves me anyway.

I still occasionally “accidentally” knock bait overboard. “Oops, butterfingers!” I say, watching the shrimp swim to freedom. Curtis pretends not to notice.

That’s what flowing taught me—you don’t have to love every aspect of something to flow with it. You just have to stop resisting the whole because of the parts.

How to Be Flowing When Your Instinct Is to Resist

By going with the flow, fishing has become the anchor of some of our best vacations—Costa Rica, Guatemala, the Keys. The memories we’ve made are priceless:

• Sunrise on the water in Costa Rica, howler monkeys calling from shore
• Curtis’s face when he caught his first roosterfish (I have 47 photos)
• The guide in Guatemala who taught me to cast properly
• That monster tarpon in the Keys that got away (thank God)
• A thousand moments of perfect quiet together on the water

That’s the secret of flowing: it’s about loosening your grip on how you think things should be, so you can enjoy what they actually are.

Recognize Your Resistance Patterns

We all have ways we resist flow:

• Physical resistance: Crossed arms, turned body, closed posture
• Mental resistance: “This is stupid,” “I hate this,” “Why am I here?”
• Emotional resistance: Anger, resentment, sulking
• Behavioral resistance: Overplanning escapes, bringing distractions
• Verbal resistance: Complaining, sarcasm, silence

I did all of these that first fishing trip. Recognizing them was the first step to releasing them.

Find Your Entry Point

You don’t have to embrace everything at once. Find one aspect you can flow with:

With fishing, my entry points were:

• Photography—I became the official fish photographer
• Wildlife watching—dolphins, birds, manatees
• Snack management—very important boat job
• Navigation—I learned to read charts
• Story keeper—remembering the funny moments

These gave me ways to participate without fully committing to fishing itself.

Become Curious Instead of Critical

Questions create flow:

Instead of: “This is boring”
Ask: “What are people getting from this?”

Instead of: “This is pointless”
Ask: “What am I not seeing?”

Instead of: “I hate this”
Ask: “What could I appreciate here?”

Curiosity dissolves resistance like water on salt.

The Physical Sensation of Flowing

Flowing has a distinct feeling in the body:

• Shoulders dropping from their defensive position
• Breath deepening from shallow resistance to full acceptance
• Jaw unclenching as you stop gritting through
• Hands opening from fists to receptive palms
• Core softening from braced to flexible
• Body swaying with the boat instead of against it

On the boat now, my body knows how to flow. It leans into turns instead of resisting. It sways with waves instead of fighting them. It has learned the water’s rhythm.

Flowing vs. Giving Up

There’s a crucial difference:

• Giving up is passive; flowing is active participation
• Giving up disconnects; flowing engages differently
• Giving up resents; flowing accepts
• Giving up withdraws; flowing adapts
• Giving up stops learning; flowing stays curious

I didn’t give up my preferences. I still prefer spa days to fishing days. But I learned to flow with Curtis’s joy, and in that flowing, found my own.

Flowing in Other Waters

Learning to flow with fishing taught me to flow elsewhere:

At Work

When new systems replace familiar ones, I remember the fishing lesson: stop resisting, start learning. Ask questions. Find my entry point. Look for what I’m not seeing.

With Technology

When nothing works as expected, I flow with the confusion instead of fighting it. Every error message is a teacher. Every crash is data.

In Marriage

When Curtis wants to watch another war documentary, I flow with his interest while secretly doing Dutch pour planning on my tablet. We’re together, both content.

With Aging

When my body changes in ways I don’t love, I try to flow with what is instead of fighting for what was. This is harder than fishing but uses the same principles.

The Unexpected Gifts of Flowing

By flowing with fishing, I received gifts I never expected:

• Connection with Curtis deeper than any spa day could create
• Appreciation for nature I’d missed from shore
• Understanding of patience that serves everywhere
• Stories and memories that make us laugh years later
• A metaphor for life—flowing with what is instead of fighting

Some of our deepest bonds have been forged on boats at dawn, him teaching me about currents, me teaching him it’s okay to release the big ones sometimes.

Creating Flow in Resistance

When you meet resistance (in yourself or others), try these flow-creators:

Lower the Stakes

“Just try for 30 minutes” instead of committing to forever

Create Options

“You can read while I fish” instead of forced participation

Honor Limits

“We’ll go in after lunch” instead of dawn-to-dusk marathons

Find Compromise

“I’ll fish mornings if we do something I love afternoons”

Celebrate Small Flows

“You touched the fishing rod!” instead of expecting immediate expertise

When Flowing Feels Impossible

Some things we can’t flow with—abuse, violation of values, harm to others. Flowing isn’t about accepting everything. It’s about choosing where resistance serves and where it merely limits.

I flow with fishing. I don’t flow with Curtis’s occasional desire to keep undersized fish. Some boundaries create healthy flow channels.

The Ongoing Practice

I still liberate bait sometimes. Old habits die hard. But now it’s a joke between us, not a resistance.

“Did that shrimp just accidentally fall off the hook?” Curtis asks.

“Weird how that keeps happening,” I reply.

We flow with each other’s quirks.

Last week, planning our next trip, Curtis suggested a fishing lodge in Alaska. Five years ago, I would have countered with a spa in Sedona. Now I said, “How many layers will I need?”

That’s flowing—not losing yourself, but letting yourself be carried somewhere new.

Your Invitation to Flow

Whatever you’re resisting right now—a partner’s passion, a life change, a new reality—consider flowing with it instead of against it.

Not surrendering your needs, but loosening your grip on how you think things should be. Not abandoning preferences, but expanding possibilities.

Find your entry point. Ask curious questions. Participate in your own way. Let the current teach you something you didn’t know you needed to learn.

You might discover what I did: the thing you’re resisting might carry you somewhere beautiful. The activity you hate might hold memories you’ll treasure. The compromise might become connection.

And even if you never love it (I still don’t love bait), you might love what it brings—joy to someone you love, adventures you never expected, a version of yourself you didn’t know existed.

That’s the magic of flowing—it takes you places forcing never could. Even if those places involve fish slime and 4 AM wake-ups and pretending you’re devastated when the big one gets away.