Maybe the Answer Lies in the Starfish
A few days ago, someone in my mastermind group brought up the story of the starfish. Do you know it? I’d heard it many times, but it really resonated this time.
“The Star Thrower” was originally written by Loren C. Eiseley. The gist of the story is this:
Early one morning, an old man arrives on the beach to find the entire beach strewn with starfish which had been washed up by a big storm — there are hundreds, if not thousands, as far as his eye can see.
The man soon comes upon a small child. He watches as the child carefully picks up a star fish, and throws it back into the sea. Then another. And another.
The old man laughs and says, “Can’t you see how many there are? You’re really not going to make much difference.”
The child pauses for a moment, then bends down, picks up another starfish and hurls it into the receding tides. He smiles at the old man and says, “I made a difference for THAT one!”
This story came up in the mastermind group in the context of the paradoxical urges so many of us are feeling these days. Maybe you can relate…
I know sometimes I vacillate between feeling such a strong passion to make a difference in the world — to save multiple beaches’ worth of starfish — that I willingly put in 12 hour days, working on my book and all its many ancillary projects, designing courses, seeing clients…doing whatever I can to make a difference on as large a scale as I can — by getting out there and doing something to change the world.
And then….then there are times I feel like I just want to go be a hermit on a mountaintop (or, okay, more realistically, on a tropical island somewhere.) But the point is, I want to get as far away from technology and the craziness of the outer world as I can. In those moments I question whether I could better contribute to transforming consciousness — and maintaining my own sanity — by choosing a life of relative solitude and quiet meditation, a life in which it’s more about being than doing.
In a dualistic world, perhaps it’s a natural inclination to seesaw between extremes, when things are so precariously out of balance.
Maybe the answer lies in the starfish. Maybe some of us are meant to joyfully help thousands of starfish find their way back to their Source. Maybe some of us are meant to pick up only one starfish. Maybe some of us are meant to sit on the beach and just be at peace, while others do the tossing.
Perhaps we’re all meant to find our own balance, our own rhythms of doing and being, our own unique ways of contributing to the greater good. Perhaps there’s no one way that’s “right” or better than another way. Just right for us. In that moment.
And right for the starfish.
