row row row your boat

Life is an ocean (hah how cheesy is that. alright cmon get serious)—vast, directionless, and unknown. We are each given a rowboat, a small vessel floating in the endless expanse. This rowboat is ours alone; it is not meant to be permanently attached to anything larger.

Along the way, we encounter larger boats: grand yachts of religion, towering cruise ships of societal norms, battleships of ideology, and drifting wreckage of trauma. These vessels offer safety, structure, and the illusion of certainty. They promise direction in a sea that has none, a purpose in the midst of the unknown. When our rowboat starts to leak—when life becomes painful, uncertain, or overwhelming—we are tempted to jump ship.

At first, climbing aboard these bigger vessels feels like salvation. They offer comfort, a crew to belong to, and a structure that tells us who we are. We adopt the beliefs of the ship we board, take on its identity, and convince ourselves that this is reality. The rowboat—our personal vessel, our individual journey—is left behind, slowly drifting away into the fog.

For some, the rowboat is abandoned for so long that the idea of jumping back into the water and swimming toward it feels impossible. The sea, once an invitation to explore, becomes a terrifying abyss. The thought of leaving behind the structure and certainty of the bigger ships feels like death itself. But here is the paradox: the moment you jump, your rowboat reappears.

However, this doesn’t mean we should reject the bigger ships entirely. Some people refuse to board at all, believing that stepping onto another vessel means betraying their own truth. They cling tightly to their rowboat, fearing that exploration will lead to corruption, that engaging with other beliefs, systems, or experiences will somehow dilute who they are. But avoidance is just another form of stagnation. Growth is not in rigid attachment to our own vessel, nor is it in blindly surrendering to another. It is in the movement between.

Relationships are perhaps the most challenging and revealing ships we will ever encounter on this journey. In a world where modern love is often fused with identity, security, and self-worth, the idea of remaining individuals within a partnership can feel counterintuitive—if not outright terrifying.

When we tether our rowboats together, we are not merging into one entity but choosing to navigate life side by side. This means embracing the reality that our partner has their own oars, their own direction, and their own evolving internal world. But this is where the struggle begins. Because deep down, many of us don’t want to simply tether—we want to climb aboard, abandon our own vessel, and make the relationship itself the new ship we reside in. We want the comfort, the safety, the promise that we will not have to row alone.

This is where the first barrier arises: control disguised as love. When we fear that our partner’s individuality threatens the union, we try to steer their boat, dictate their direction, or make their movements match our own. We confuse closeness with sameness, believing that true love means never drifting apart, never changing course, never feeling uncertainty. But this clinging often exposes a deeper wound—not a lack of love, but a lack of trust.

Trust not just in our partner, but in ourselves.

Many people unknowingly enter relationships to escape the discomfort of their own rowboat—the solitude, the responsibility, the self-work they’ve avoided. They see love as a vessel to climb aboard, an identity to assume, a role to fulfill. But relationships were never meant to be the destination. They are the winds that shape us, the storms that test us, and the calm waters that allow us to rest before continuing onward. When we mistake them for the entire journey, we risk losing our sense of self entirely.

The second barrier: the fear of independence. In a deeply attached relationship, the idea of one person temporarily untying their boat—whether to explore personal growth, navigate internal struggles, or simply realign—can feel like a betrayal. This fear is often a projection of our own insecurity, the unspoken belief that if given too much space, our partner will realize they no longer need us. But true partnership is not about dependence; it is about choosing one another, again and again, from a place of freedom rather than fear.

This is why the oscillation—learning, unlearning, relearning—is so crucial. Some days, we will row in perfect sync. Other days, we will drift apart, each exploring different waters. And sometimes, we may even need to untether completely, not as an ending, but as an opportunity to return with fresh eyes, deeper understanding, and a stronger sense of self.

But this is difficult to accept because it contradicts everything we’ve been taught about love. We are conditioned to believe that “forever” means unchanging, that commitment means never wavering, that true love means never feeling alone. In reality, love is not the absence of uncertainty—it is the willingness to face it, together or apart.

Some will spend their entire lives aboard the "relationship ship," believing that if they just hold on tightly enough, they will never have to confront the vast ocean of the unknown. Others will refuse to tether at all, fearing that any attachment will strip them of their freedom. But the true beauty of love lies in balance—the ability to sail together while still trusting in the strength of our own boat.

So if you ever find yourself questioning your place in a relationship, ask yourself:

• Am I still in my own boat, or have I abandoned it entirely?

• Am I trying to control my partner’s direction instead of trusting their journey?

• Do I fear giving space because I am afraid of what I might find in my own solitude?

Love is not about merging into one. It is about choosing, every day, to row beside someone—not because you need them to complete your journey, but because you want to witness theirs.

Life is oscillation—on and off, on and off. Learning, unlearning, and relearning. Boarding a ship allows us to witness new perspectives, to see through the eyes of those who have traveled different waters. But to stay indefinitely is to forget that the rowboat was ever ours to begin with. Likewise, to never step off our rowboat is to deny ourselves the expansion that comes with experience. The irony of human nature is that even in our attempts to break free from systems, we often end up creating new ones. We leave one ship only to eagerly climb aboard another—sometimes without realizing we’ve done so. This is especially evident in the way people reject one group only to unconsciously form another, bound by the same need for identity, validation, and belonging.

A person may abandon religion, disillusioned by its rigid doctrines, only to fully embrace the “spiritual” ship, adopting a new set of beliefs just as unquestioningly. Someone else might reject mainstream society in favor of counterculture, convinced they’ve escaped conformity, only to shape their life around a different, yet equally dogmatic, set of ideals. The individual who prides themselves on being a “free thinker” often surrounds themselves with others who think exactly the same way. The cycle repeats endlessly.

The problem isn’t what ship we board—it’s why we board it. If we jump onto a new vessel simply because it offers us a sense of identity, superiority, or external validation, we are still operating from the same unconscious need. The ego is remarkably adaptable; it will take whatever we give it and turn it into a new source of self-worth. Even “good” things—knowledge, spirituality, activism, success—can become another illusion if they are used as tools for identity rather than genuine experience.

This is where the process fails us. Not because learning, growing, or seeking new perspectives is wrong, but because the moment we start defining ourselves by these things, we lose the ability to move freely. Instead of using ships as tools for exploration, we anchor ourselves to them, believing that we have finally found “truth” or “the right way.” But truth is not a static destination—it is the fluidity of experience itself.

At the end of the day, no ship—no philosophy, belief system, or identity—can replace the necessity of our own rowboat. If we tether ourselves too tightly to anything, even in rebellion against something else, we have merely traded one attachment for another. True freedom comes not from rejecting all ships, but from knowing we can step aboard, explore, and depart—without fear of losing ourselves in the process.

Some will spend lifetimes aboard ships of various kinds, finding comfort in their structure and stability. Others will rarely leave their rowboat, determined to chart their own course, even if it means facing the waves alone. Everyone’s process is unique, shaped by their own rhythm of seeking and returning.

The key is not in choosing one or the other, but in recognizing that movement itself—leaving, returning, questioning, evolving—is the heart of the experience. The sea was never meant to be conquered, only traveled. And it is in this ebb and flow, this willingness to both let go and come back, that we find the true essence of our journey. Row row row your boat.