Alligator Watch

A BonBon

When you’re up to your ass in alligators, it’s hard to remember you came to drain the swamp.

Author Unknown

Sometimes alligator attacks seem like they’ll go on forever. No sooner have you dealt with one crisis, then there’s another, then another, then another. Each attack insists on being taken seriously and handled NOW.

Alligators seem to come in bunches—triumph over one and there are many more in line.

When beset by the need to bail a sinking boat or solve a crisis, speed and endurance are critical. Your ability to do anything the “right” way, let alone the “carefully planned” way, is a routine casualty.

The assaults that come with living in crises mode are draining and soul deadening. “If I can just get through this, then…”

Anything that’s less urgent gets pushed into “then….” Life as you’d like to live it inevitably goes on “hold.” If you dare to wonder “How much more can I take?” you needn’t wait long to find out.

Fortunately, such trials help us to find strengths seldom used and to discover what matters most. The need to find “those things that endure” becomes paramount. Trivialities fall away, and you get to find out who your true friends are. Such discoveries are the upside of the downside.

As you drag on, enduring, struggling, fending off whatever form the alligator of the moment takes, what could possibly seem like progress? As long as there’s yet another alligator, you’re vulnerable to their persistent influence. You can be pulled into the fray repeatedly—rather than rising above it.

Take heart—look at what you’ve been through, and survived, and discovered (although the value of that comes later, in a more reflective mode).

Recognize the swamp is a bit less swampy. And the original goal is not as far off as it was.

Notice, too, you’re now only up to your knees in alligators. Can ankles be far behind?