Young Fish, Old Fish

The small moments add up together to make your life what it is, so do not forget to stop and see them, to enjoy them, and take that spirit into your care practices.

Welcome to toddlerhood, where every moment is new, exciting, and very repetitive. It’s easy to do a mental check-out, but I am occasionally reminded to snap back to it. These moments might become tedious, but they are also quick to come, quick to go, and also the foundation to everything else beyond.

I have a 3-year-old who is in that long, long phase where every movie she comes across must be watched 532 times, minimum. Some movies we strongly encourage her to move on from; for other movies, we can take a deep breath and accept one more run.

Number One on the docket is the Disney movie Soul (2020). We are about 30 plays in, now, and I am still kind of enjoying this flick! I grew up on Disney princesses and while I cannot stand several of them anymore, they’re a different sort of princess these days. Disney and its princess have grown up, moved on and become a bit more creative. Sometimes there isn't even a princess.

Soul is the story of a Jazz musician named Joe. He is not a prince; in fact, he is not fashionable, he is quite selfish, somewhat short sighted, and he is not especially successful. Personally, I only liked him at first because I can appreciate his incredible, starry eyed, unbreakable passion. You see, Joe loves jazz. LOVES jazz. We all had something we loved like this at one time, and the difference between us and Joe is probably that we got jaded and gave up on it, or got tired of being beaten up on it, or burned out on it. Joe never did. There is something to be admired in that.

On the other hand, Joe has been obsessed with music to the exclusion of all other things in his life, including the people around him. He has been so wrapped up in jazz that he might not be able to tell you the color of his own house. He has so been fixated on his Big Break, that a full time position as a music teacher reads to him like a death blow.

Now - mild spoilers - Joe does finally get his shot when he is given the chance to play with the legendary Dorothea Williams Quartet. He has one chance to make it or break it; he faces this opportunity with desperation, dogged determination and single-minded direction. He is sure his whole life will be heaven if he makes it, hell if he loses. When he gets up on stage with Dorothea towards the end of the movie, his mom is there to cheer him on. Mom’s friends are there, too - Joe doesn’t really have friends of his own. Joe plays from his heart and soul, he plays the way a musician does when it feeds off the stage and the audience feels that tingle in their bones. Joe pours his whole being into this Big Break, and when he looks up again, Dorothea is looking back at him with a smile. He has made it, the culmination of his life’s efforts has come together on this night.

When the night end, though, Joe still has to come down from that high. He is still in regular old real life.

“Now what?”

Says Dorothea, “we come back tomorrow night, do it all again!”

Though he has lusted for this his whole life, though he has put every waking moment into this achievement, the mundanity of it is striking to Joe, and he frowns. Dorothea catches on. She smirks.

“I heard this story about a fish,” she tells him. “He swims up to this older fish and says:

‘I’m trying to find this thing they call the ocean.’

‘The ocean?’ says the older fish, ‘that’s what you’re in right now.’

‘This?’ says the young fish ‘This is water. What I want is the ocean.’ “

This is not a new fable, it’s been around a long time. I heard some variation of it somewhere along the way long before this movie and no doubt you have, too. But at this time in my life and as I am starting up Project BurnBright, it has struck me differently. I can’t shake this little lesson from my brain.

Life is the small moments we live, every second of every minute of the day. You are spending countless of those moments on patients, on children, friends and family, caregiving in some form or another – you are a healthcare worker, giving endless time to others. It is so easy to get wrapped up in a bad day, a bad week, a rough month. Or, man, 'this last year hasn't been the best'. Well, if you can fixate on all those little things that made it 'bad' or 'rough', can you not also fixate on the things that made it good?

That's all a bad day is, a few moments. They all end up in the same place. Regular old life.

Today, try to be mindful of the present. Are you enjoying it, are you not? Why? Can you do something different? Just because today is going well, can't you make these next ten minutes great? Or, if the day is going really well, can you face the next ten minutes with fortitude, acceptance and grace, even if they are hard?

Those ten minutes are all you need. Joe can't be on the stage 24/7 and neither can you.

Even better, if you can find joy in those little moments and in those smallest bits of time, you can bring unto yourself a happier, healthier life – and that is the spirit you will take to your patients. Bring them joy, engagement, and dedication. Notice them, see them, and be the caregiver they need.

They will know the difference and so will you.