This summer has been a bit rough, from friends who are going through hardships to my own personal issues. To add insult to injury, our rock is in the middle of one of the worst droughts on record, and the landscape, which is typically lush and green, is all brown and dead. But the one ray of proverbial sunshine is the sea. In contrast to the depressing inland landscape, the sea remains its gorgeous, blue-green self. One of the first things I do every morning is step out onto the balcony to check out my local beach and see which shade of turquoise the water is today.

But despite having direct, visual access to the sea, I sometimes go weeks without actually dipping my toes in the water (or in the sand). Life gets in the way, whether you live in a city, in the country, or on a tropical island.

This was the case recently. It had been two weeks since I’d had any “vitamin sea,” so I set an intention to go to the beach one Friday afternoon. The universe conspired against me – errands in town took twice as long as they should have (even considering the way things operate on this island), clouds moved in, and my mood was less than sunny and light. It was almost two hours later than I had planned, but with persistence (aka stubbornness) on my side, I finally made it.

Rather than visiting my local beach, which is large, well-known, and easy to access, I decided to venture a little farther and visit a beach that’s more secluded and rarely visited by anyone other than guests a small, nearby resort. And as luck would have it, I was the only one there on this particular afternoon.

When I go to the beach alone, I typically just get in the water for a few minutes to cool off and spend most of the time in a beach chair, catching up on some leisure reading. But this time, I decided to hang out in the water for a while. Since I didn’t bring a float or noodle to laze around on, I just floated on my back, with my ears submerged in the water to block out the sounds of the outside world. I floated, and floated, and floated, for what seemed like forever (although in reality, it was probably more like five minutes).

As I floated, looking up at the blue sky and listening to the faint crackling of the water, I tried to put some mental energy towards assessing the things that are going on in my life and in my friends’ lives. But my mind wouldn’t cooperate. The situations arose in my mind, but my mind refused to latch onto them. Granted, my problems and my friends’ problems didn’t go away, but it was nice to have a respite that forced me to get out of my own head for a while. Often times, a clear head is what’s needed to see things for what they really are, deal with them, and begin the process of healing. And this is just what that dip in water allowed me to do.

If everyone had direct access to the healing powers of the sea, I believe the world would be a better place.