Going with the flow can be useful, with restraint and boundaries. If your car is spinning out of control, maybe letting go of the steering wheel helps you to straighten out and survive. If you are in some sort of emotional chaos or drama, going with the flow helps you to live another day, so you can identify calmer shores to land on when day breaks.
But sometimes going with the flow for too long can be determinantal. It is a way of not wanting to take responsibility in your life. Again, sure, if something in the short run happens, like getting laid off, go with the flow, they can’t afford to keep you, so move on, pack your box and leave the office, but at some point you have to make choices. In this example, what do you want to do after being laid off? Find another similar job? Get some job training? Go to school for a different industry? Move back in with your parents? Get a room mate? Live out of your car? There are options. But it is easy to freeze in place. Not wanting to make the wrong choice, or choose no to the alternative possibilities that you would also like is tough. But you do have to make a choice at some point. (Not making a choice is philosophically a choice, I know.) If you don’t make a choice, you will keep slipping down the metaphorical river. Slipping past opportunities. Not grounding or investing in any option. You can continue to go with the flow, but you will only have missed opportunities. Opportunities are great, but only if you seize them. Reality, choice, focus, responsibility, and work are what transform a theoretical opportunity into actual progress, success, change, or rewards.
If you keep going with the flow for too long, you give up your power to shape your own life. You are letting the wild current shape your destiny, and without any clear direction, it probably won’t be much. It is unlikely you’ll accidentally get a college degree, become a CEO, found your own business, buy your own house. Whatever your goals are, they are unlikely to just land in your lap without you first putting some energy towards that goal. You have to take some steps in that direction before life will offer you help to speed down your path.
Go with the flow to survive the storm that capsized your boat in a river, but at some point you will have to pick a place to make shore and start making conscious decisions again.
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