Sink, swim, stay afloat
This is an incident that occurred in 2019 when I had joined a creative agency in their events department. I was three months in and we had just returned from managing a complicated two-week event that took place outside of States.
When we got back, our senior manager wanted to meet with each of us for a debrief.
When it was my turn, he said, “you’ve been doing pretty well. I know we pushed you into the deep end when you joined, and that’s just the nature of our work. One can either sink or swim. And you swam. So keep it up.”
We left the conference room after, and I couldn’t help but think of that statement all day.
Everyone talks about sinking or swimming in the deep end and applies that concept to anything related in life. You either sink or swim. What about staying afloat.
It’s worth noting, knowing how to float is the first step in learning how to swim freestyle. Staying afloat saves lives, and if anything, prevents one from sinking.
And this isn’t an easy skill to master either. I read up on how to get floating vertically in water:
- Allow your legs to relax and sink down. Spread your arms wide to each side.
- Take a big, deep breath to have maximum buoyancy and tilt your head back so your mouth and nose point upwards.
- Breathe gently in and out to keep your nose and mouth above the waterline.
- If you sink too low, you might have to do a few gentle kicks with your legs to get just that bit above the water line to breathe.
- Don’t kick too hard because that will cause too much bobbing up and down.
Now isn’t that a good life skill to have or even one that can be applied to work? When times are tough and there’s pressure — stay calm, as an example?
