Vervolg Byron Bay

Been here for a while now and it's starting to grow on me. Exchange my german roommate for a dude from Sydney. This morning I went snorkling with the trutles at Julia island, awesome.

They take you there in a RIB (ridgit inflatable boat) sporting twin fourstroke outboards, which in time were sporting 100 horsepower each. That already was quite the experience. First they drive you in a truck btw. I talk to my fellow snorklers and divers. Me "so do you diver look down on us snorklers?" them "naah we look up to you", me "have you ever been bitten by a shark", them "naah, they prefer snorklers, there's not as much metal" :D.

So me and the other only other snorkler get to go overboard first (while the divers undoubtely mock us, the moment we do :P). It's crazy, you look down and it's like you've been dumped INTO the Sydney aquirium! I see fishy's everywhere! Those fish that can blow themselves up and have spikes are everywhere. But that's not all.. I see three HUGE rays! Little further I see a sea turtle just chillin about. I dive down and come within inches of touching it. Then I see a frickin huge Wobbegong (flat shark, with spots and without teeth)! So I swim around those creatues for about an hour, diving down at times (couldn't go that deep because of the pressure on my ears). At the very end I all of a sudden see a huge shark just sitting on the bottom! Strange enough I wasn't scared... you know that they won't put you out somewhere where you'll get killed and the shark seemed to be minding it's own business.

So that was great, definitely will get my diving certificate later on. It would be cool to be able to to dive to the bottom and stay under for longer.

The rest of the day I run around town, talking to the people in the shops and just enjoying the nice weather. Did some shopping too. Got new (quite ridiculous, yet cool) sun glasses. And three new T-shirts (I wanted only one, but could get two extra for only 10 pounds!! wow...). So now I have a black shirt that says "you have the right to remain silent.... so please shut up!".

Go runnin across the beach at sundown (which is at 6pm, becuase it's WINTER). At the end it was almost dark and I had a insightful experience (or well, I thought so). I was running right next to the water, because that's where the sand is wet and you don't sink in as far. Then I realized how great that moment was. Like you're always thinking about what is wrong with reality and your life (seems to be an inate tendency of thought). But that stopped for a moment and I noticed that I was effortless propelling my body across the sands of a beautiful beach well looking at the sun going under behind the mountains. That's when the running itself really did become effortless, like it just happens, like you're not doing it yourself (which the Buddhist would argue, you are, in fact, not). But wait! There's more :P I could notice that every time a wave would come in, I would evade it and alter my running technique as to keep my shorts from getting wet (so I wouldn't have to clean them). But then I thought, fuck my shorts man :P So I just kept running no matter what kind of wave came in. Soon I was running through the warm, yet refreshing water, with the aforementioned scenery still and it was amazing... so I ended up running an extra kilometer like that, because it was so effortless.

So yeah, as cliché as it is, that is a good analogy for life. A lot of times we're (or at least I am) worrying about our shorts getting wet, while if we'd just forget about that for a moment we'd discover something like a fantastic running experience right underneath our noses. Cuz honestly if you're worrying about your shorts and about how far you still have to run, that's when you have to put in a ton of effort and it becomes similar to torturing yourself. It's not the physical movement that is torturing you, it is the thought-process.

Because I have to be social here, or completely lonely, I've noticed something similar there. If you're worrying about wether people will like you, that's when everything takes a ton of effort, you have to think about million things to keep everyeone happy and even then they never are all happy. Because let's face it, not everyone is gonna like you, nor are they ALL gonna always be happy, no matter what you do. So I say fuck my shorts and fuck whether everyone likes me.