Life Lessons From A Kayak: Know When To Let Go

I paddled the Willamette River in Portland, Oregon, and decided to spend my time "boat chasing." A friend and I went to the deepest, choppiest waters where the huge ships cross, waiting for the wakes from these monsters. We rolled over the top of them like two tiny toothpicks, like we were on an aqua roller coaster, and laughed like children. We rode the wakes of tugs, speed boats and luxury cruisers, a paddle-wheel steamer, and a Titanic-sized cargo ship that weighted up to 100,000 tons.

As we enjoyed our lunch break on the sandy beach that sunny afternoon, two bald eagles swooped sharply into view, their talons locked and bodies twisted in combat. As they fought in flight they spiraled towards earth. Before either of them could plunge into the water below, they released their grips and flew off in separate directions. In a matter of seconds their conflict was resolved; neither of them wanted to hit the water. What surprised me was their complete willingness to "let go" when the struggle became life-threatening, as if instinctively they knew that releasing the struggle was better than dying because of it.

It wasn't until we were paddling back to shore at the end of the day, tired but amused at the fun we'd had, that we heard the blast of a horn, and looked to see the strangest and scariest military vessel cutting through the water towards us. I can honestly say I've never been frightened while kayaking, until this moment. The ship looked like a camouflaged tank, and was flanked with machine guns, soldiers, and 4 surface to air missiles! In that moment I thought, "We're dead!" My heart was hammering as my friend and I hugged the shore. They passed-dark, quiet and ominous as a Stealth Bomber on water, the soldiers waving and grinning at us like the friendly next-door-neighbors. I waved and smiled and gave them the thumbs-up sign, because inside I was thinking, "Oh God, please don't kill us." Obviously, the military vessel was a combat ship guarding the waterways. Seeing such fire-power up-close started me thinking about all the ways we humans have devised to defend ourselves, and how different it is from how nature handles it.

In the eagle's world, if nobody is going to win by hanging on in battle, they instinctively release their grip and go their separate ways. In contrast, we humans feel a need to win, a need to be "right," and sometimes, we would rather "go down with the ship" than to let it go. This "need to be right," is so strong in humans that Alfred Adler, a psychologist and contemporary of Sigmund Freud's termed it, "Superiority Complex." His theory says that because a part of us feels inferior (because we make mistakes), to compensate, we will strive to prove we are superior to others. This tendency can be seen clearly in competitive sports, where the goal is to "beat" the other team. Sporting events appeal to our need for superiority, the need to defeat the opposition. But back to the birds for a minute. Why don't they feel this need for superiority? Are they so egalitarian (or, eagle-aterian, in this case) that they only have minor scuffles?

In the eagle's world they will fight to the death with another bird...but interestingly,  not at the expense of hurting themselves. It seems they know when to "call it quits." This is because eagles have a strong self-preservation instinct that allows them to disengage from combat when their life is threatened. Compare that to human combat, and the desperate need to feel superior. To our own detriment we will refuse to back down from a fight, even when the consequences are dire. We build more powerful military fire-power as a way of intimidating our enemies into submission (hey, it worked on me!). A clear example of governmental "Superiority Complex" was our government's need to sent men to the moon so we could beat the Russian cosmonauts, and be the first to plant our American flag on the moon's surface. It seems mankind has a love-affair with being the biggest and the baddest.

The downside of all this muscle-flexing is that someone has to lose because of it. Anytime there is a winning team, there is also someone feeling like a loser. To bring this closer to home, anytime we insist on being right, we have just made someone else wrong. And, maybe they were wrong...but here's the thing that birds seem to know that we don't: once the battle is over, it's time to let go. Release it, and fly away. If we're going to be injured in the process, maybe we shouldn't insist on keeping the battle raging. To tell you the truth, I was more impressed with the bald eagles way of taking care of business than I was with the show of militarism. At least the eagles knew when enough was enough.  

Life Lessons From A Kayak: Know when to let go.