Tina: [00:00:00] Hi everyone. Welcome back to another episode of Tina's Arena. Today I have on my Fred Morgan and she is here to tell us a story.

Morgan: Hi Tina. Thank you so much for having me. I recently started a new job and one of the challenges of starting a new job, especially when you're mid-career, is it, it takes some time to accumulate leave and kinda get yourself set up so that you can go and do some of those fun vacations.

So I had been working really hard over the last six months to accumulate. Scrounge away a little bit of time. And so finally, finally, we got to go on vacation, but if any of you, your listeners have ever gone on vacation with kids it can be really hard to get packed, get ready,

I am the type Of person that going on vacation is not just packing a bag, jumping on a flight and going somewhere. We pack mountain bikes and climbing gear and paddleboards and, uh, camping for multiple days. So it was like just a huge push [00:01:00] to get ourselves up and going. So we spent most of our day on Saturday packing, um, settling in, just getting everybody going.

Our kids were anxious to get on the road. And so we finally got on the road and we were going up to Whistler, which is about a three hour drive from my house. We were staying at a condo for the first few days of our week long vacation. And there was a pool my daughter loves, loves pools and just is so, she's a water person.

And so she wanted to go to the pool. I'm like, I don't wanna go to the pool. I don't wanna get wet. I just did all this work. But she drove me down there and I'm like, well, I'll sit in the hot tub. And so she was over in the pool and the hot tub was just next to it and bouncing around, playing, just having the time of her life.

And I was sitting in the hot tub and she kept on poking her head, you know, bouncing in a pool as you do like. Poking her [00:02:00] head over to the hot club. Come on mom, come on mom. And I was like, ah, I don't want to, I just wanna sit here. I wanna relax. I don't want, I'm, you know, recovering from all the stress of, months of working in a new job plus.

The stress of packing for the vacation. Um, and this is gonna sound really funny. I was having a good hair day. I didn't wanna get my hair wet. I'm a curly girl. And, uh, it was just, it's one of those silly things that sometimes you just get stuck in, like, kinda like, have this nice hair. Okay. That's very embarrassing to say.

So anyway, my daughter finally like lured me from the hot tub to the pool and um, you know, she's bouncing around and kicking and. Flipping circles and diving, and I'm just kind of there, kind of up to my chest. I didn't really wanna go in any deeper. And she looks at me, she's like, mom, put your head underwater.

Ah, I don't want to. And she said, mom, [00:03:00] you already have to take a shower. Just put your head under the water. And in that moment, I just cracked up. I was like, she's right. I already am going to take a shower tonight. Why not just bunk my head and go underwater? So with my daughter's prodding and she was watching me and looking at me, I finally allowed myself to just completely submerge under the water, and it was like a light went off.

All of a sudden I went underwater. I felt that cold water rushing over my head. My hair just swirling all around me, and I got flooded with this memory of being a child and being at a pool in a hot eastern Washington area and jumping into my dad's arms and him catching me, and I would dunk underneath and come back up.[00:04:00]

And it was a memory of safety, of connection, and of immense joy, and it happened in a flash as soon as I allowed myself to be submerged. So I came up out of the water. That memory just completely sparked inside of me, and my heart just felt so open. I just, I came up and my daughter's huge grin met me and she's like, mom, you did it.

You did it. How don't you feel great? And I'm like, thank you. Thank you for reminding me that joy. And in that moment, she and I had that same connection that my dad and I had when I was a little girl. Like I was blown away by the resistance that I felt. And the complete release that allowed me to connect to my [00:05:00] child, to that sense of joy, to that sense of presence that really fuels the type of vacation we wanted to have.

And so as the vacation unfolded and we were, you know, doing all these fun things, had that sense of submerging throughout our entire time. That experience really made me think a lot more about the role water plays in our life. Mm-hmm. And I, I am a water person. I am from the Pacific Northwest. So when I am without rain for a couple days, I feel like I'm dehydrated and dried out and like my soul needs replenishment.

I grew up in my twenties working in southeast Alaska on a boat, literally living on the water, and my [00:06:00] passion was humpback whales and glaciers and marine life. Then in my thirties I worked on river systems and restoration and I got to be part of working towards recovery of endangered species. And now in my new role, I am working on a lake system.

And now we protect that lake system, which provides a variety of different services, including being the primary drinking water source for my community. , It's taken me a bit to land in like this new job in finding the joy that I had in when I was working in the river systems. And I was talking to a good friend of mine.

He's like, why do we care about lakes? Like it's just a lake. What? What is a lake? And she said, well. The rivers are exciting. They're dynamic. They're kind of like toddlers. They have have their tantrums and they have big events and little events, and they do all these dynamic and fun things [00:07:00] in the lakes.

They're like the grandmothers of the water bodies. They're wise, they're patient. If you're a lake ecologist, you know, things don't move very and happen very fast. There. And they're like these wide open arms that say, come on, I'll, I'll take care of you in the summer heat. You can come join, jump, feel that joy, feel that excitement.

And so my friend pointed that feeling out to me that you get when you're with Lakes. And I thought, oh, that's so true. We all love and gravitate towards water. We, it's such a necessary part, not just of our survival, like we all need water to grow food and we need water to drink, but our soul survival, the feeling and connecting to joy to some things bigger than [00:08:00] us. Water is for joying, it's, it's for the joy of being.

And the more and more we can be like my daughter, inviting us into the water to dunk, to experience, to remember that life is a joyful experience when we allow ourselves to release and let go of the need for the perfect hair that water is here for us and we can be here for it. And. When we approach the system with love and with heart, we hope that we can move beyond the fighting and see the love in each other and find a path and a solution forward.

Tina: , The joy that your daughter sparked. It reminds me of my nieces, how they have a pool and they're always in and out of the water playing and actually I never play with them.

So it's just like making me think about that and how. I'm probably blocking [00:09:00] myself from a little bit of this joy because I never ever get in the water. I can't really swim well. So that's been like the story I tell myself in my head, but like I can just stand in the shallow side. Like I could do that.

Morgan: Yeah, you can stand in the shallow side and dunk and see what happens.

Tina: Mm-hmm. Yeah. So yeah, it's a huge reminder to just like let go of that. Perfectionism is a good hair day because that's totally relatable, not crazy at all. We plan our around the hair wash days, right?

Morgan: That's right. Um, yeah, and I, my daughter that, that one in particular, she always puts things in those simple ways.

It's like, mom, you're gonna have to take a shower anyway. Just, oh my gosh. You're, you're Ted

Tina: and you're so wise. Mm-hmm. Has she been a big source of teachings for you? [00:10:00]

Morgan: Oh, yes. This is my, my child who has really prompted my growth as a human, as a person, and promoted and, and forced me to grow up. To learn how to deal with my, my own emotions to kind of push myself toward patient's presence, connection.

Because this is my daughter who it's a big, big feeling, the big joy and the big pain. And she's not afraid to express it.

Tina: That's beautiful. How she can feel safe enough to express it. Because able to hold that container, which is really hard as a parent. Right. I imagine. Well, and that's

Morgan: what I've really had to learn and how to sit with my own discomfort of her discomfort and how to not try to fix things for her [00:11:00] but allow her trust that she can figure it out and be that safe space in the guardrails for when things feel really hard.

Um, but sitting with. You know, your child who is obviously struggling and, you know, providing that reassurance is, is not always the, um, go-to approach for parenting. It's certainly not the go-to approach that I was raised with, which was, go away, you'll be fine. You, you're too big of a feeler.

Just, don't bother us with that.

Tina: Yeah, just suck it up or ignore it.

Morgan: Yeah, suck it up buttercup.

Tina: You mentioned a symbiotic relationship between us and the water. Do you think that there are things or maybe more things that we should be doing to be taking care of the water as it provides so much for us?

Morgan: You know, our water is a thing that's really, uh. Changing as [00:12:00] our whole ecosystems change. And so I think, and I work hard, you know, I've been in the environmental space my entire career. I've always been very aware of the impacts we have on our planet and our resources. Um, I also am very try to be very aware of the reciprocity that we have in these relationships.

I give to the water and the water gives to me and I give to the earth and the plants in my garden and my garden provides for me. And so to me, a lot of what I like to speak to and how people think about is what is a reciprocal relationship that you can foster in your local place, in your local community that.

Isn't just, um, from the taking space, but is truly in that space of loving and giving and appreciation and gratitude for the earth and for the things that it provides. sometimes we turn on the [00:13:00] tap and we forget and disconnect. From the fact that that is like a really precious gift and a really precious resource.

And there's a lot that goes into getting the water from its source to your tap. And you know, for those of us in, the west, like pretty much guaranteed when you turn on the top, it's gonna be relatively safe water and, and. Not everybody has that. And for me that's another piece of my appreciation is just for the privilege that I have in being able to have relatively strong confidence in the water that I am receiving and that I get to.

Tina: Mm-hmm. I had that experience actually very recently where I went to Ohio and I got water at [00:14:00] a restaurant and it tasted like dirt when I drank it. I don't know how to describe it. Someone told me it was probably from well, and that's why it tasted like that, but I never had that experience 'cause I have municipal water where we are and it's actually very clean and so that.

Gave me immense gratitude for the city that I live in and the water resources that we have.

Morgan: We just learned recently, there's like water tasting events. Okay. Where like you can go and sample water from different places. Like some people might really enjoy the taste of a dirty well.

Mm-hmm.

Tina: Yeah. And actually I never really thought about it too much, but when you were talking. Through your story. I live in a city with water and I have my whole life, but it's never been a huge presence or something that I am acutely grateful for, but. [00:15:00] I think if I were to have grown up somewhere else, I would have missed the water.

Like I live next to the Detroit River. Right. And it wasn't clean when I grew up. I remember it being very brown and dirty and like you never went in it, but just the presence of it as calming. It is this very calming space and energy that is just present.

All of the time, and I've never really paid attention to it, but it's just been there. It's been there and present. Yeah. Like you said.

Morgan: Yeah. Yeah. It's like sometimes you pay attention and you start to see, oh, like, oh, that, that really does influence the way I feel, or the way I associate my identity in this place.

And I do think it's pretty amazing to look back at like. What was happening in the past with our water systems, um, our, our rivers and our lakes and our streams, and some of the work that we have been able to achieve to create healthier, [00:16:00] cleaner water. It's not everywhere. And I think the. We need to continue to advocate for those water resources, not just for us, but for biodiversity, for, systems that are going to be resilient to changes as they come.

Um, but yeah, we went through an era in, you know, where rivers were on fire and we don't really see that as much anymore. I think that watching those changes over time and recognizing it takes people. To decide that the Detroit, Detroit River is worth it. The Detroit River is a living system that is worth the investment of, having that ability to run clear and to be, uh, a healthy and safe place.

And as we clean it up, you know, you go from that mucky, dirty, whatever to a system that is. [00:17:00] Functioning properly. It, you know, more birds come in and you have these, you get plants along the edges and trees that are providing shade and it becomes these gathering places.

Tina: Mm-hmm. How would you respond to someone who feels like their efforts aren't worth it, because they're just one small individual?

Morgan: I mean, I struggle with that sometimes too, being somebody who has worked in like an environmental field for so long. But to me so much of the way I approach this work is being the love that we need to have. And I think one drop in the bucket ricochets out to others. Just like when you put a drop in in the water and you see the ripple effects out.

It can feel like you're small, but you never know how you are affecting and influencing others just by the way that you are being and the way that [00:18:00] you are appreciating and being joy in this, in the world.

Tina: Thank you. Yes, because sometimes, I mean, you said you struggle with that sometimes too, and Me Too, where it just feels like there are so many huge.

Things that are happening in the earth that like dump things into the ocean and stuff, and we're just one small individual, but I can recycle this one thing and mm-hmm. And do my own piece to help the world. And I think maybe also the, the knowing in ourselves of like doing good will probably encourage us to also do more good.

Morgan: Yeah. And you know, I, I do think that there is a really important step in understanding like our environment and the climate crisis and the species, you know, just mass extinction events is to really understand and experience the grief and not be afraid of [00:19:00] your own grief and emotions. Because so much of what I see happening is that.

People are afraid to face that reality. That is the world that we're in because they're afraid of experiencing grief. And the more we can fit with our grief and kind of experience and feel it and give it some space, I think the easier it is to act in that more compassionate way. When you fight your grief, you can sometimes, or this is what happens to me, right?

Fighting my grief. I'm trying to deny the experience, and so I just continue on the path of these behaviors that maybe aren't beneficial to the broader context in the broader community. Um, but when I can allow myself to acknowledge those feelings, um, it's like it opens up that more compassionate path because I've been [00:20:00] compassionate with myself.

Tina: Mm-hmm. That makes a lot of sense. Because you have to have it within you before you can give it away or apply it elsewhere.

Morgan: Yeah. Yeah. There is a lot coming at us right now in our world, and I think it's really hard to hold it all. And so the other thing that I often talk about is like. What's the one small thing that you care about?

And just stay focused on that and try not to get bogged down in everything, but choose. Choose your thing and keep. Be aware as you need to, but keep yourself moving in the right direction. And if you can hold those boundaries with those other challenges and just know that you're affecting that one space I think that can also help with the feelings of overwhelm of, and of not making an impact.[00:21:00]

Tina: How are you cultivating joy these days? I know your vacation was pretty recent. Um, is there anything else that you've been working on for joy or creativity?

Morgan: Yeah, I mean, joy and creativity is sort of an ongoing cultivation in a practice. I noticed when I don't actively, um, work at it. It goes away. And so as I started this new position and, you know, I was nervous and all these old patterns emerged of overperforming and perfectionism my joy and my creativity completely disappeared.

And so I've been working on reregulating my nervous system to help me reground into my heart and remembering that. It's, that's who I am. And to do that, it's, um, for me at this point, I'm in picking up my gratitude practice again and really doubling down on being [00:22:00] intentional about how I facilitate gratitude in my life.

I am in many ways practicing the being of humanness instead of the doing of humanness and allowing myself to have. Space and time to just be with like a tree sitting there and just observing and, and holding it. Not not trying to be everything to everyone, but just provide and nurture, um, for myself and my family right now.

And so, you know, those are some things. There's so much that I do in practice too. Work to cultivate joy. Including lifting very heavy weights, like that's a huge part of my process. It gets me back in my body, outta my head and in my body and aware.

Tina: [00:23:00] Yeah, I agree with the exercise in general. It helps bring us back into the present moment for sure, which is an into the body, which is so important for a lot of people to do.

Um, I think we can start to wrap up the episode. Is there anything else on your heart that you really wanted to share with the audience today? Morgan?

Morgan: Thank you for letting me share my story about water and to share that piece of me with your audience. I hope that in sharing the story, you know, you might also, those listening may also have an experience or reflection on an experience like this and be able to see how really joy is cultivated in those very ordinary moments, and it doesn't take.

The extraordinary, um, in all cases to get there. It's really nurturing those tiny moments of connection that [00:24:00] can bring us the most joy in our lives.

Tina: Thank you, Morgan. I'm grateful for your presence here on the podcast.

Morgan: Thank you for inviting me.

If you live in Windsor, Essex County area in Ontario, Canada, then you should know that I host an open mic live storytelling event the last Saturday of every month at Aloe Lounge on Erie Street in Little Italy from five to 7:00 PM If you don't know what open mic storytelling is, well, I encourage anyone to come up and share their story.

We have different themes every month, the event. Celebrates connection, our humanness, our emotions, our rawness. It gives us space to really express ourselves and to have people listen because I feel like we don't really get too much of this anymore. It is essentially a gathering of the souls and sharing a little part of ourselves.

With each other, whether it be a [00:25:00] funny story, a sad story, a happy story, a romantic story, any story that is yours you can share. And I'm loving the community that is coming from this event, so come to the event. I hope to see you there. You can purchase tickets at Tales of the town.ca.