The Way of Dispossession

Black Tip Reef Sharks, Green Morays, and Camouflaged Frogfish

I just came back from a week of diving on the volcanic island of Saba and was impressed again by the ‘isness’ of aquatic life. Each creature plays its own part by acting out (accepting) its specific role on the coral reef: a blacktop reef shark hunts in the open blue; a green moray eel peers out of her den searching for prey; a hilarious looking frogfish masks itself on the sea fan.

Everything is what it is by simply being what God intended it to be. Often we humans make it far more complicated by pretending to be who and what we are not. I considered this conundrum as I came across these lines from T.S. Eliot:

In order to possess what you do not possess you must go by the way of dispossession. In order to arrive at what you are not you must go through the way in which you are not.

The underwater biosphere embodies the sage’s musing. Let’s start this week by being who we really are.