Just Keep Swimming

Swimming with dolphins in Hawaii was not just a magical moment but a wake-up call that revealed a fear. This episode of the Charging Station Podcast takes you along my emotional and transformative journey of learning to swim at 48, spurred by the tragic loss of my daughter. From initial setbacks to when I took my first confident strokes in deep water, you'll hear how persistence and embracing new beginnings can lead to incredible personal growth.

Chapters

• 0:22 Swim Lessons and Overcoming Fear
• 9:25 Swimming Skills
• 13:42 Facing Fear, Overcoming Challenges
• 25:15 Embracing Fear and Overcoming Trauma
• 31:50 Learning at Your Own Pace
• 41:48 Connecting With Listeners

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:22

What's good everybody. Welcome to the Charging Station podcast. It's your girl, tracy Massey of Living my Empowered Life. Hey, hey, hey, what's up? What's up? How you doing, boo? I hope you are doing well. If this is your first time joining us, hey, welcome to the couchy couch. Come on in, take your shoes off, have a seat. If you are a returning listener, you know I love me some. You Welcome back, boo, y'all.

Speaker 1: 0:49

2024 has been amazing, but before we get into it, I want y'all to go ahead, grab your coffee, grab your tea, grab your water, grab your wine, whatever your beverage of choice is. Go ahead, grab that thing-a-thing and have a seat on the couch couch and make sure that you are following us on all of the socials. Find me on instagram, twitter, not twitter, sorry. Instagram, tiktok, facebook, youtube threads, living my empowered life, all of them. Make sure you're on my email list. And, um, yeah, make sure you are active on the socials because I'll be there most of the time, mostly on Instagram, if you know, you know. Also, make sure that you are subscribed or following this podcast and please do me a big old favor and rate and leave a review or whatever podcast platform you're listening to this on. Make sure you follow the instructions or whatever that platform is. If you are on Apple Podcasts, it's real easy Just follow, click the little plus sign, leave a five-star rating and a review, because those ratings and reviews and follows and subscribes help get the podcast out to more people. So I appreciate you. If y'all want me to keep on going, y'all gonna, you know, help a sister out, help me out. Anyway, I hope you all are doing well.

Speaker 1: 2:14

Can you believe we are in season eight of this thing? Ah, eight is the number of new beginnings. I can't believe. I've been doing this for seven years. I'm so very thankful. I'm so very thankful. I'm so, so, very thankful.

Speaker 1: 2:28

But I just want to fill y'all in on something. If you follow me on the socials, you already know this. But if you don't which you know the podcast audience is huge. We are heard in over 60 something countries and growing by the week. Thank you for listening wherever you are. What's up Bali? What's up Maldives? What's up Malta? Hey y'all, hopefully one of these days I'll get to visit some of these places where our listeners are. That is definitely a wish and a goal of mine. But speaking of wishes, let me go ahead and just preface this by saying I am no longer sitting in the wish. If I wish something, I'm going to take action to get to it. So my prayer is that you do the same, and with that we're going to get into what this episode is about.

Speaker 1: 3:23

So, if you don't know, I have been taking swim lessons. Yes, at the big age of 48, at least I'm 48 at the time I recorded this episode I decided to take swim lessons and this is the first time that I've taken swim lessons. I started right after my daughter passed away. When my daughter passed away, I went to Hawaii and I swam with dolphins there and I should be doing videos so you can see the air quotes that I'm doing. But I went to swim with dolphins and that was the moment that you know, the realization of the fact that I could not swim came really real for me, because we were in this deep pool with these big old fish. I don't know if you've ever seen a dolphin up close in real life. They're huge. The particular dolphin that I was with weighed 800 pounds. Big boy, big, big boy. They were friendly, thank goodness. They were friendly, thank goodness, but they were huge. And I just remember telling the lifeguards and the trainers there, you know, stick beside me because I can't swim. Now we did have on flotation devices and everything, but I'm in the middle of this big old 40 foot deep pool, not knowing how to swim with these gigantic fish like the. They're huge. So I conquered a fear.

Speaker 1: 4:50

I don't even know why I wanted to go swim with the dolphins. I literally was sitting at, um, this orientation kind of thing. So if you've gone on vacation before, you know, sometimes you go to, depending on who you travel with. The travel agency that I was going through with put me with this travel vendor. And so the travel vendor actually had like an orientation that you can go to and you can select the activities that you wanted to do. And for some reason I chose to swim with the activities that you wanted to do and for some reason I chose to swim with the dolphins. I don't know. I don't know why. I don't know why I had never thought about doing this before and then, all of a sudden, I just wanted to do it and I did it and then the reality hit and I'm like girl, what was you thinking? But I'm glad I did, because I didn't even want to. I didn't know that that was something that I wanted to do, so we did it and it was an amazing experience, but I don't ever have to do it again.

Speaker 1: 5:53

But when I came back home from that trip, I decided that swim lessons would be a good idea, and so I signed up for swim lessons and, I will be honest, the instructor wasn't that great and I got discouraged. So I quit. Yeah, yeah, I quit. And not knowing how to swim bothered me for years, and so finally I was just like you know what, let me go ahead and learn how to swim. And so I signed up for swim lessons at my local gym. Let me go ahead and learn how to swim. And so I signed up for swim lessons at my local gym, and this was back in November of 23. I started right before Thanksgiving and the instructor there was so nice and so kind and was an amazing teacher. The classes were small because it was the bird months. You know, people aren't thinking about swim lessons when it's cold, and so that's the main reason why I did it, because I knew that I wanted to do I did it.

Speaker 1: 6:50

That's the main reason why I did it in November, because I knew I wanted to have swim lessons, but I didn't feel ready for private lessons and I wanted an opportunity to be in a group, but in a small group and it and it was. It was like 12 of us and when I first got there I got so scared. I've never been afraid of the water. I realized now that I've had a fear of deep water, but we'll get into that. I've never had a fear of water, but when I got there and realized what I was about to do, it really did scare me and so I shared on my Instagram stories. You know, hey, I'm here doing my first swim lesson and all of a sudden I got scared.

Speaker 1: 7:33

But then I remembered what I promised myself at the beginning of 2024. I said that I was no longer going to be hindered by two things. One of them was fear, and one of them was people. I was no longer going to allow fear to hold me back from the things that I wanted to try, do or experience, and I was not going to allow myself to be held by, held back by people, by what they said, thought or just made up in their own minds, or even waiting on people to do things, because there have been instances where I've missed out on great opportunities because I've waited on people like not traveling. That's the main reason why I travel by myself. I will take a solo trip in a heartbeat because I got tired of waiting on people to decide if they want to go, if they had a fear of going. So now I'm like I will invite you, but know that I'm still going whether you go or not. And so I made that decision to do that, do things afraid. And so got to the first class, I was so scared it didn't hit me until I got to the pool and saw the water and I'm like, okay, I'm really getting ready to do this, I'm really getting ready to do this. And the first day of class I was so proud of myself because we went in and then I realized, ah, I can float. So it was a lot of skills that I had that I didn't realize that I had until the instructor started to bring them out of me and the instructor. Every week I would come back and the instructor would add on a new drill, would add on a new task, would do this and do this, and so I began to really take to the water and it was pretty cool. It was a challenge for me, a challenge that I think that I definitely needed, but it was pretty cool to see how I was progressing so fast forward.

Speaker 1: 9:25

I continue to sign up for swim. Well, wait a minute, fast forward. I took a break from swim lessons the month of March because that's my birth month. I knew I was going to be turnt all the way up litty for my birthday. I celebrate my birthday the entire month of March and on March 17th, my actual birthday oh, it gets bananas, okay. So I took the time off from the swim lessons because I knew every weekend I was going to have something and I didn't want to sign up and not be there. That's a waste of money. So I took March and April off because those months were busy, started back up in June of 2024. Did I start in June, june or July?

Speaker 1: 10:12

But the summer of 2024, I went back and this time the classes were a little more full.

Speaker 1: 10:18

I actually got in.

Speaker 1: 10:19

Yeah, it was June. I actually got in one of the last two spots for the June sessions and this class was big, so big that we had three instructors and what they did was they. Everybody starts on ground zero, the very first class. So you go in. They see what you can do. Can you put, are you comfortable with putting your head under the water? Can you float on your back? Can you float on your front side? Can you do strokes? So can you freestyle? What are your kicks, like? Those kinds of things, the drills that they teach you.

Speaker 1: 10:54

So there I was, um, being able to do all of those things, and then they were like you can swim, like why are you here? And I'm like I can't, and so here's the thing. Here's, here's one lesson I want you all to get out of this. There are going to be a lot of gems that I'm going to drop in this episode, because these are the things that I learned in this process know your capabilities and don't let anybody talk you out of them. Like, don't let anybody like push you too far, too quickly. You know what you're able to do. But also there's a caveat have a good instructor, mentor, coach, whatever there that can pull those things out of you, because we can limit ourselves, because we get comfortable in a space that we're in.

Speaker 1: 11:37

And so I knew that I was not comfortable with um. My strokes and my kicks were not strong. I knew this. But to them, to their eyes and this is the first time they're meeting me they're like oh, you can swim. I'm like, no, I can't. That's why I'm here. So I was able to verbalize and articulate like no, I'm not ready for this next phase. But my instructors, who were so good, were able to say you're ready, you just don't know it. Able to say you're ready, you just don't know it. And we just need to practice this to get you comfortable.

Speaker 1: 12:08

So they broke up the class into beginner, intermediate and more advanced. At that point I was in the intermediate group, had no idea I was intermediate. So at that point the instructions changed. The drills became a little, a little, not necessarily hard, they became different. The drills were a little different and they were longer. So we started swimming from one end of the pool to the other with the kickboard.

Speaker 1: 12:40

So then I realized like girl, you got to get back in this cardio because baby. But then my instructor was like you got to realize, when you're using the kickboard, all you're doing is kicking, you're not using your arms, which propel you. Ah. So with that I realized, ok, I'm using half of my capability, but in order to learn this skill, in order to get stronger in this skill. I have to focus on this part. That's not very strong, and so what I learned in that is sometimes we get, we do get ahead of ourselves. So, like I know, I got this part mastered, but it's not. It's not strong. I may know how to do it technically, but I'm not strong yet, and so before I add this other element on, let me go ahead and get strong in this area. So that taught me to slow it down a little bit, master this, get strong in this and then add on another element. So, fast forward to now.

Speaker 1: 13:42

I wanted to take it up a notch. So I have a goal to reach by November. In November, I'm taking a big trip and I wanted to be able to swim, swim by November. Now, the reason why I said this, said swim twice, and started laughing, is because we got this thing in the black culture you say something twice like you're serious about it. So I wanted to be able to swim, swim by November, by my trip in November Meaning not holding on to the side of the pool wall, sitting on the stairs or holding on to the ladders or being on the shallow end, because I know that I can stand up. I wanted to be able to get in that deep water and just do the darn thing, so I stepped it up a notch.

Speaker 1: 14:31

I'm still taking my group swim lessons, but then I got my swim instructor privately. So I'm doing swim lessons twice a week and let me tell you the difference that this has made. For one, it's even more challenging because now the focus is on me instead of the whole group. When you have that one-on-one instruction, you get to see the difference where what your form is like. You get to see if you're holding your breath too long, because that is a thing. You get to see if your strokes are bad. So you get to see how you have grown and developed and where you can grow and develop some more, because now your instructor is focused solely on you. So I would do my private lesson right before, like a couple days before, the group class. So by the time I get to the group class I'm moving up even more and people are like, oh, you can swim, you can swim, you got this, you got this. And I'm like, no, for one, people didn't see the work that I was doing before. So the practice that I was getting in before, so I'm getting the practice in with my swim instructor, but also I'm going to the pool like two or three days before my swim lesson so I can practice the skill that I was taught the week before. Sometimes we just got to get in there and practice and do some extra work in order for us to be able to master it and feel comfortable in it. So we're doing the private lesson.

Speaker 1: 16:08

And the thing about the private lesson my instructor was asking me well, what is it that you want to hone in on? What is it that you want to definitely walk away with after these lessons are done? And I said, well, one, I need to work on my breathing. So there's this the breathing technique when you do freestyle swimming. I have not mastered how to do that. It is very important that you be able to breathe when you're swimming because you know, I'm not a fish. My lungs need air. I can flip on my back in survival mode so I can get some air, but I want to be able to freestyle swim and not have to stop and still be able to breathe. So we're. She said, okay, we can work on that. And I said I also want to be able to tread water. Okay. So those are two skills, two goals that I set forth, that I wanted to work on. And she said, okay, we can do that, and then we can work on these other things too. We can work on these other things too.

Speaker 1: 17:09

So she surprised me one day. She says, so, we're going to go to a different pool. I was like, okay. She said, yeah, this one's deeper. And I'm like, oh, okay. And she says to me, yeah, you're going to, you're going to get into the deeper end. It's about eight feet. Are you okay with that? My body, my mind, my soul, my spirit was saying no, but out of my mouth it came yes. So she said, okay, we're going to meet at this pool at this time. I'll see you there. Okay, I get there and I realized, okay, what's about to happen. She's going to have me go into a deeper end.

Speaker 1: 17:43

So this pool, the pool that I've been taking my original lessons in, goes up to about four feet. I'm 5'1", I can stand up, I'm good. This pool goes up to eight feet. So the reality of not being able to touch the bottom, you know my survival skill that I would tell myself girl, just stand up. You're tell myself, girl, just stand up, not going down, just stand up, okay, I can't stand up in eight feet of water.

Speaker 1: 18:10

So I get there and I'm thinking she's going to have me start from the shallow end, get warmed up, get acclimated, and then we move, we progress to deeper water. No, ma'am, pam, I get there. There she's like come on down to the deep end. And I said to do what she says, you're gonna jump in. I said who gonna do what now? She said yeah, you're gonna jump in.

Speaker 1: 18:33

I said why can't we start from the shallow? And she said no, because we start from the shallow and you're gonna freak out when we get down here. She said we're just gonna jump in. She said you have been doing this long enough that you know what to do, and I'm right here with you when you do it. That, right there, ministered to me, because isn't life like that, like we know what to do? But when we have somebody there that has been teaching us and instructing us and guiding us, hello, holy Spirit. When we go into these situations where we're fearful, we always have somebody that's with us. So, holy Spirit, when we go into these situations where we're fearful, we always have somebody that's with us. So I'm going down to the deep end and I'm like oh, I can feel my heart beating in my ears and I'm scared. I'm not scared, scared, I'm scared. So I get down to the deeper end.

Speaker 1: 19:24

You know, she makes swimming look so easy because she's been doing this since she was like knee-high to a grasshopper. So she's just, you know, floating, making it look effortless. Then she's like okay, are you just jumping when you're ready? And I'm like I'm not ready, by this time I can feel my body tensing. So I had to do some deep breathing and calm myself down because I can do this. My mind, I'm telling myself that I can do this. I'm telling myself I can do this, but I know that my mind is going into protect mode because this is something that I had never done. So by that time the lifeguard comes over and she's like you can do it. She said I'm here, do you want me to jump in with you if you do it? I'm like no, no, no, no, I got to do it, I got to do it.

Speaker 1: 20:10

Then the people in the office start coming out. So by now people are realizing what's happening, and so they're coming to cheer me on. No pressure, right? That just made me nervous. What people most people don't know about me is I'm very shy, I'm very much of an introvert and I don't like a lot of attention on me, even though I can get on stages and give speeches, I can do this podcast, I can get on like all that. I don't like a lot of attention on me. This was giving me a lot of attention, so everybody's like trying to encourage me and everything I said. Finally, I just stop talking. Just stop talking because I had to silence the noise and sometimes we have to do that when we're in a panic or fearful or whatever. Sometimes we just have to silence the noise.

Speaker 1: 20:55

And so I closed my eyes and y'all. I wish, I wish I had a picture of how my toes were clinging to the side of the pool, the edge of the pool. I was like so nervous I think I was white knuckling the edge of the pool with my toes but I closed my eyes, I took a deep breath, I held my nose because I didn't want water running up in my nose and I jumped in. When I opened my eyes, I was underwater and the first thing I said to myself was don't panic, and I jumped in. When I opened my eyes, I was underwater and the first thing I said was to myself was don't panic. And I realized I was floating. I was floating back up to the top and I said, oh, ok.

Speaker 1: 21:32

And immediately what I learned kicked in. I started to tread water and when I looked around and my head came up above water, morgan was smiling, the lifeguard was cheering me on, the people that were in the lanes beside us that were swimming, they stopped swimming. They were clapping for me. Everybody was clapping, and I'm like I did it. I have never been so proud of myself than in that moment. Right then I conquered that fear and then I realized what was happening. I was like where's the wall? Where's the wall to the pool? I was like where's the wall to the pool? And so I was holding on to the wall. I was standing on the stairs and Morgan was like you did it, you did it, great job, great job.

Speaker 1: 22:18

So we went through the skills and by the time we had gotten into the lesson, I felt more comfortable. But then she upped it up a notch and I'm like OK, so she takes me. She says, ok, you're going to swim from the deep end to the shallow end. Ok, cool, I'm swimming. Cool, I have to. You know, since I haven't mastered the rhythm of the side breathing with freestyling, I flip on my back. Instinct kicked in. You don't understand how survival skills kick in until you have to use them. So I flip on my back and I'm floating on my back, I'm kind of like still kicking and moving my arms, so I'm still moving in the water and then I flip back over. Next thing, I realized I'm in the shallow and I can stand up, but I swim all the way to the end. And then I stand up and I'm like I'm looking at the other end of the pool and I'm like, yo, I just swam from that end to this end. Huh, that's pretty cool.

Speaker 1: 23:19

So my swim instructor allows me to catch my breath and then she says all right, we're going to go back, you're going to swim back. And I said okay. She said what I want you to do is look at the line at the bottom of the pool. She said don't think about the drop, look at the line of the pool. And I'm like okay, because it's an Olympic-sized pool. So here in the city there are Olympic athletes who come to train there at that particular pool so you can imagine the lanes that are lined. So, okay, I'm in the shallow end.

Speaker 1: 24:02

I start off swimming, swimming, swimming, swimming, swimming, flip, swimming, swimming, swim. And then I look and I see the line drop. I immediately knew that I was in the deep end and I felt my entire body like clamp. I felt every muscle just, and I had to flip on my back real quick because I knew if I hadn't done that I was going to start to go into a panic and I'm like Tracy, trust the skills that you learned, trust your body, you got this. So I float on my back, still kicking, still moving, still breathing. I'm able to take deep, slow breaths to kind of calm my nerves. And then, when I felt ready, I flipped back over and I swam to the other end and then I was like I just swam all the way from the shallow end to the deep end and by the end of our lesson I was able to do a skills check and I passed, I passed. Do a skills check and I passed, I passed. I was able to tread water for a minute and do my strokes and everything and I was like, wow, t, you really did that.

Speaker 1: 25:15

And I'm so proud of myself, because the old me would not have done that, the old me would not have have embraced that fear and embrace the challenges. I would have taken my panic as failure and like, see, you can't do this, don't do that. So sometimes we got to shut off the self-talk as well, because I don't know about you. I'm my hardest and worst critic. Nobody can talk down to me better than I can. So much so that I will never forget my best friend telling me to not speak about her best friend in the manner of which I had spoken about myself in front of her ever again, and I've been mindful of that ever since she said that, and this has been about five or six years ago. So thank you, bestie, and that's a perfect example of why you need to have good, sound friends.

Speaker 1: 26:07

So I am still taking the swim lessons because, again, I want to hone in and build those skills and get so comfortable with myself, like I actually want to get to the point where I can pass a lifeguarding test. I'm not going to be a lifeguard now, no, no, no, I'm not making a career change, but I just want to know that I'm able to do that skill set because in order to pass a lifeguard test, you got to be able to swim. Swim because you're saving somebody's life. So I want to read um that someone has shared with me in my dms, because I have a ton of people that get in my dms and say, oh, I'm so inspired by what you're doing, I wish I could do that, blah, blah, blah.

Speaker 1: 26:54

And so this is um, someone that I know, actually, who said to me that they wish they knew how to swim, and I'm just going to read this exchange to you If I can find it. Did I delete it? I don't know, I may have to go off memory y'all, and if I have to bless it, bless it if I have to. Okay, yeah, I found it Right. So we talk a lot Um, so let me just scroll up, but I hope that so far, this is helping you conquer a fear that you may have, or if you felt defeated in something you know I hope this is you hear something in here that helped you. And so she dm'd me and she said I wish I could swim. And I said don't sit in the wish, take the the lessons and learn. And I know that that's easier said than done, because a lot of people really do have a fear. She says I'm scared of the water. And so the coach psychologist kicked in and I said to her you take showers and wash your hands, so I know you aren't scared of water.

Speaker 1: 28:02

The fear is something else. Unpack that fear. Is it a past trauma with a large body of water? Is it a fear of drowning? Unpack it to conquer it. An instructor, a good one, can help you overcome the fear. And she reveals to me that she almost drowned as a kid. So, fun fact, I almost drowned as a kid too, because some adults thought that it would be wise to just throw me in the deep end of the water. They knew that I could not swim, but they thought it would be wise to throw me in the deep end of the water because they, I guess they felt like I would automatically learn how to swim. And no, not so. So I almost drowned. They did have to come in and get me, and I think that was the first time that I've ever saw my mama go. Mama bear, that's a story for another day.

Speaker 1: 28:54

So I replied to my friend that's it because, meaning that we just figured out why she has this fear. We just figured out why she has this fear, and I shared with her that I almost drowned as a kid and I actually got a whooping for being near the water because my mom told me not to go near the water and I did anyway. So, yeah, I might need to talk to my therapist about that, because that was weird. Like I almost died, mama, then you going to whoop me anyway. So. And then we had a pool party, so why could not be near the water if you bring me to a pool party? That didn't make sense. The math was math in there. But anyway, I digress and so I said I told my friend that you deserve to not live in the trauma of the past, and I say that to you as well you deserve to not live in the trauma of the past.

Speaker 1: 29:46

How many things have happened in our lives where we just still sit there? It's a lot of things that impact us when we were, that happened to us when we were kids, that still impact us in our adulthood, and this is why I am such an advocate for therapy. A good therapist will unpack that trauma and help you work through it and give you good coping skills and resources to never to be in a place where you never are severely impacted by it again, and I just hope and I pray that you are able to unpack your traumas and grow from them, because you are definitely worth the fight, definitely Definitely worth the fight and, as somebody who has been through a lot of trauma, I'm actually a trauma survivor multiple times over. When people look at me, they will never know that I've been through the things that I've been through unless I share them with them, because I made a decision to not be held back anymore. The Bible tells us that God wants us to have life and to live life more abundantly. My abundant life, my empowered life, is not tied to fear, not saying that I'm never going to feel fear again because I will. You let a spider come crawl across here and I'm going to be like ah, ah. But there's a difference between having a fear and having a trauma-induced fear and I don't want to live in that trauma-induced fear anymore. So I'm out here kicking butt and taking names when it comes to this fear and, like I said, the only way you're going to know if you can actually do something is if you do it and when you have somebody that is standing beside you, teaching you and guiding you and leading you. There's so much you can do and you'll be surprised at how far you come. So just keep swimming, just keep swimming, just keep swimming, swimming, swimming, just keep swimming, swimming, swimming, like Dory in Finding Nemo.

Speaker 1: 31:50

So there was something that I learned in the group classes and I shared this with my mentor and I hope I can remember it, like how I said it to her. I should have written it down, but I was telling her you know, being in these group classes, when I first started swimming, they would give us the instruction, so everybody would be there. They would give us the instruction, they would demonstrate the drill so we could see what it looked like, and then they would work with us to get the learn, the skill. I'm going to tell you where I started messing up. I started messing up when I started looking at the other students, when I started looking at their progress, because some students picked up things faster than I did. So when they would swim faster than me, like when we started swimming from one end of the pool to the other, I was always the last one to get there. Always that started to frustrate me and then I was like girl, you got to realize you got to swim at your own pace. Because I don't know what their mindset was. I was like I was more focused on learning the drill, learning the skill. It didn't matter how fast I got there. So it doesn't matter how you finish, is that you finish? So I would like y'all go ahead. I'll get there when I get there. If y'all need to swim back, I'm gonna get you.

Speaker 1: 33:04

But I started messing up when I started looking at everybody else's progress and not paying attention to my own, and I started messing up when it started to pick up like their, their bad habits. So a lot of times when you're being taught something, the instructor is going to give you the instructions and show you how to do it the proper way, the right way, but you're going to always pick up something that's going to be catered to you and then it gets to a point where it's like you're no longer showing your work, you just getting the result. So there came a point where I would watch somebody kick, because kicking has not been my strong suit. Like I kick way too much and you actually don't have to do a whole lot of kicking when you swim. If you are a swimmer. You know what I'm talking about. But it seems like you're constantly moving your feet. No, you're not. Like there are points where you just kind of glide through the water and you just kind of like work with the water, let the water keep you afloat, and things like that Keep air in your lungs. You're going to float.

Speaker 1: 34:05

But I was looking at their technique and then it did not work for me. I mean, it was so bad that I would start to sink. And I'm like well, why am I sinking? And my instructor said one day it's because you're not doing the technique the way that I taught you. You're looking at somebody else's technique and that doesn't work for you. Baby, when I tell you the light bulb came on, I was like, oh, this applies to my entire life then. Because when I'm looking at somebody's technique, they're not saying that I don't need instruction because, again, the instructor showed me how to do this thing. But our body types are different, our body makeups are different, the way we learn is different, the way we move is different. She gave me the fundamental, but I had to figure it out in a way that it worked for me. Ah, amen, I hope y'all caught that. So, when I'm still doing the fundamentals and figuring out the way the technique works for me, I stopped sinking, I started gliding through the water and that's why it looked like to the untrained eye. It looked like I knew what I was doing.

Speaker 1: 35:13

I'm learning, just like everybody else, and that's the thing with life. You may have a great technique, you may have even honed in on a couple skills and be strong at them, and it looks like you got it all together. But let's be real. We are all learning every day. And when we start to understand that everybody on this planet first of all has to start from ground zero and learn something, everybody starts off as a beginner. Don't be embarrassed. Don't be embarrassed because you don't know something. Learn it and learn it at your own pace and be proud of yourself when you do learning, but don't get complacent. Learn something else. Celebrate your win, but learn something else. And I'm so thankful for, first of all, god showing me all these lessons and just these daggone swim classes, because he's just so amazing, but also being able to realize that it is not as bad as I thought here.

Speaker 1: 36:21

I was afraid of deep water when all I had to do was learn how to float. Somebody gonna catch that Sometimes. We just gotta learn how to float, you just gotta learn how to float. And the thing about one thing I've learned about swimming there's even a technique to treading water. So when I first started treading water, my instructor had to correct me because I was doing it wrong. I was exerting way more energy than what was necessary and what I needed.

Speaker 1: 36:55

So, treading water, I'm thinking I'm gonna have to kick my legs like out. Like I can't explain it, you kind of have to see it. So I'm thinking I have to kick my legs out, away from my body, and it's more so. I'm in, I'm straight, like I'm, I'm, everything is aligned and my arms are out and doing like their thing, um, keeping me afloat, and but my legs are kind of like it's almost like riding a bicycle or being on an elliptical machine yeah, that's probably the best way I can describe it kind of like being on an elliptical machine, um, that uses less energy. So when I was doing it the first way and my swim instructor didn't even realize that I was treading water wrong until we got into that deep water, because you really can't tell in in three feet, but when we got in the deeper end, she was able to see what I was actually doing and how I was not. I was not doing the correct technique, and that's why it was costing so much energy, why I was getting so tired when all I had to do was let the water work with me.

Speaker 1: 38:04

And one thing that I learned is don't fight the water, because you will actually float. You'll be surprised. You will actually float as long as you're breathing, and so I am still continuing the lessons. I'm going to keep going until my trip in November. At the time of the recording of this podcast, it is September 28th, and so I am still going.

Speaker 1: 38:35

And another thing, another nugget I want to give y'all do it until you get it. Don't do it because somebody is telling you otherwise. Don't let anything stop you from reaching your goal. Now, be wise, use wisdom and discernment when reaching your goals, because you got to learn when to know when to hold them and know when to fold them. Everything is not meant to be a now thing, so use your wisdom, but you can tell the difference between somebody actually giving you wise counsel and somebody that is putting their fear on you, or somebody that's coming to you from a place that they've never experienced.

Speaker 1: 39:19

I remember somebody telling me I have this desire to live abroad and I can't tell you how many people would tell me, oh, it's dangerous in such and such place. I'm like it's dangerous in the United States, what are you talking about? And this person didn't even have a passport, but they're telling me how dangerous it is someplace else. I'm like how do you know? Were you there? You weren't there. So sometimes you my mentor, said it best Always consider the source.

Speaker 1: 39:51

If it's someone who's never left their small town, how are you going to tell me what it's like to travel to another country? You never even left this small town. We have two different perspectives. We have two different experiences. Your experience is out of hearsay, mine is going to be out of actual being there. Consider the source, actual being there. Consider the source. All right, y'all, that's it. That's all I got for this week.

Speaker 1: 40:21

I hope that this has helped you in some kind of way. If you have a fear, baby, conquer that thing. Conquer that thing. Don't let that fear hold you back. God has not given you a spirit of fear, but a power, love and a sound mind, and that does not mean that we will not feel fear. What it means is that we're going to deal with it a whole lot different than what others would.

Speaker 1: 40:40

So with that I bid you adieu, because I'm actually it's a Saturday afternoon. I got so much stuff to do y'all, I actually got to go and get some work done on my nine to five on a Saturday. I know child. I know child. Yesterday, at the time of recording this podcast, we had Hurricane Helene come through here and I had no power for about eight hours. I had no electrical power but I still had the power of the Holy Spirit, amen. So I got to catch up on some work from yesterday. So, and do laundry, you know all the Saturday stuff, all the Saturday running around, but I hope and I pray that you will return next week.

Speaker 1: 41:20

And you know, did you know that you can leave me a text message? You can message me now, girl. Yeah, at the bottom of the show notes, um, you'll see a link that says send me a message or text me or something like that. Send me a message and I will shout you out on next episode. I can can't type you back, so I can't reply back in writing, but I can shout you out on the next episode. So make sure that you leave me a message, let me know what you think about this episode, what you think about the show, if there are any topics you want me to cover and discuss, um, all that stuff.

Speaker 1: 41:48

You know this is an interactive podcast, even though I'm sitting here talking, you know you, you my friend. I need you to talk back because I don't want to look crazy sitting here talking to myself. But yeah, make sure you text me, let me know what you think and be sure to follow me on all the socials, like I said earlier, and do all that good stuff. I just want to know that you're there and know that. I want you to know that I appreciate you and I thank you for all that you've done and you're doing, and know that. I want you to know that I appreciate you and I thank you for all that you've done and you're doing and for being so supportive. You know I love, love, love, love, love you from the bottom of my heart. I truly, truly mean that. So until next time my peeps join me back here for another episode of the charting station podcast and remember God loves you, I love you and ain't nothing you can do about it. Boo, bye.