Living in the COVID World ... and Beyond #34: Seeing the Water that I Swim In

There’s a famous joke of one fish asking the other “how’s the water?”   The other fish replies: “What the heck is water?”   The point is that we don’t notice what surrounds us or we are so used to certain things that we don’t realize that they are there.  This is not only true about physical things (like air) but also about internal things, like patterns of behavior or feeling states.

My wife, Joanne, had some serious physical challenges this Spring.   She had hip replacement surgery which went very well.  However, she had a difficult recovery period over two months during which she repeatedly had quite debilitating back spasms.   I was with her through this process, went to all of the preliminary doctor visits, was at the hospital with her for the surgery, was her key support through the recovery process, and participated in all of the consultations post-surgery until she was fully back on her feet again and resuming her active life.

Throughout this process, I stayed confident about the decisions that Joanne was making and positive about her ability to fully heal and recover.  

When we got to the point that Joanne’s back spasms were no longer occurring and it seemed that the healing was complete, I noticed that I felt noticeably relieved.   And I realized that I could only feel so relieved if I had been feeling nervous or anxious for the previous weeks and months.   It was only when I could connect to my relief that it became apparent to me what I had actually been experiencing through Joanne’s health challenge.  

A light bulb went off in my head.

As I explored this realization about how I had been worried about Joanne’s health, I actually noticed the water that I swim in almost all of the time.

I worry a lot.  And I worry about practically everything.   I worry about whether the upcoming meeting will go well.  I worry afterwards whether the meeting went well.   I worry about my friends and family.  I worry about things that I have absolutely no control over.  I worry about world events.  I worry about whether I’ll get where I’m going on time.   And the list goes on. 

I worry so constantly that I don’t even notice that I’m worrying.  It is exactly the water that I swim in.  And it is very hard to notice the water when you are swimming in it all the time.

Seeing my relief now that Joanne is well opened my eyes to how nervous I had been about Joanne’s health. And, in a larger context, helped me to notice how pervasive my tendency to worry is, how my worry attaches to seemingly everything.  

It has been helpful to have this awareness about myself.   I am now catching glimpses of my worry that had previously been unaware to me.   And I am making some adjustments in my own behavior so as not to accommodate this unaware (and sometimes unrealistic) anxiety.  

Are you aware of water that you swim in?  How have you been able to notice it?   And what have you been able to do once you have become aware of the water?