A Course in Confidence

I did a sailing course last week, which was sort of work as the purpose was for me to write up my experiences, but it turned out to be useful in more ways than the obvious, which was brushing up my sailing skills.

The course was attended by a group of Seniors, mostly with no sailing abilities at all, and one who had bought a boat and needed to learn how to sail.

It was interesting to see that some started the week pumped full of over confidence, and it took a week on a boat to realise that there is a lot more to sailing than they might have imagined. These people ended up, if not contrite, more aware of themselves and how much they had to learn. The others, lacking in confidence (and I include myself in this category), were nervous and only too aware of what they had to learn. We ended the week renewed and full of vigour, confidence in place and eager to continue learning and sailing. So everyone's abilities - and confidence - levelled out by the end of the week.

It's done me a lot of good and having got over the mid week slump (not dissimilar to mid-book slump or mid-article slump), things got a lot better, to my relief. We had our first long sail yesterday in Serenity and both loved it.

So the motto of this preamble is - when things get tough, hang on in here. If you hang in long enough, it will get better. And then you feel so much better.