What are you training for? When people ask me, “What are you training for?” my answer is simple: life. Sure, I like to take on a big swim each year (my version of misogi)—this time, I’m celebrating my 50th trip around the sun with a 50-mile swim in a Vermont lake. But here’s the thing: I don’t want training to feel like something separate from the rest of my life. I want it to fit into my days, not take them over. Training for Life, Not Just a Goal If you’ve ever looked at the long list of…

The water is fine. Periodically I peer out from under the rock where I hide, I glance at the news and see vitriol. Even the headlines seem generated to divide us. But in my backyard pool and in my adult swimming classes at Rogue X, we’re humming and floating and finding connection from our books to our toes. We’re feeling the inbuilt support of the water by bouncing ourselves like basketballs. Young and old, we’re leaning into trust. While the world pushes us to choose sides, the water asks…

The Unspoken Conversation It starts quietly. A question you didn’t expect. Not from someone—but from the water. That subtle moment before you act—the breath before the plunge, the hesitation before the yes—can reveal more than we realize. Sometimes, it’s a whisper from something deeper, asking to be heard. The water offers one of life’s most honest mirrors. Not just your reflection, but your relationship with uncertainty, with trust, with yourself. What if your relationship with the water…

Stretching the Edges—Together Comfort and growth rarely live in the same neighborhood. Yet we keep looking for shortcuts between them—ways to expand without feeling that edge of discomfort that signals real change. Once I started noticing resistance in myself, I saw it everywhere: The colleague who says, “I could never speak in public.” The friend who insists they’re “not creative.” The neighbor who feels they’re “too old to learn something new.” And in the pool, when swimmers—beginners and…

Ready or Not, Ready Enough I didn’t feel ready. Not for the spring water temps. Not for the distance. Not for everything this swim would ask of me. But I went anyway. Because sometimes, waiting to feel “ready” is just another way of hiding. And I could feel myself trying to hide! The weather looked rough. It was Mother’s Day weekend. Despite months of planning, coordinating schedules, and arranging travel to get my crew here, when push came to shove, all I wanted to do was stay home and enjoy…

When the Goal Gets in the Way Last week, I wrote about trust—how the water meets us when we show up, just as we are. How learning to trust might be the most powerful thing we can do. This week, something happened in a lesson that reminded me how easily trust slips—not from fear, but from something more subtle. I was working with a 6-year-old who had just discovered he could push off from one wall, arms in streamline, eyes on the bottom, and glide all the way across the short side of the…