On my Eastern Caribbean cruise vacation last week, I had the benefit of having a balcony cabin. Since the weather was a perfect 27°C/81°F nearly every day of the voyage, I spent a considerable amount of time on my balcony, especially on sea days. From my vantage point on the 10th deck, the water below me felt a mile away and very close at the same time (it was probably 80 feet down). I was far enough away to avoid most of the spray when we’d crash into large waves, but I got enough salt water in my hair, eyes and face to constantly remember that we were at sea.
Which is why it seemed weird to me when I would look over the balcony railing to see birds flying alongside the ship. There were no land masses to be seen (and yes, I walked to the other side of the ship to confirm there was nothing on my blind side, either). Where were these birds coming from, and what were they doing out that far over water?
Turns out, these were pelagic birds. Pelagic birds are seabirds that spend most of their time (except when they are nesting) on the ocean away from land. Examples of pelagic birds include albatross, petrels, shearwaters, storm-petrels, skuas, jaegers, tropicbirds, and certain terns. I’m not a birder like my friend Purple, but I think I have identified the ones I saw most commonly as a Brown Noddy. Pelagic birds have an ability to dive into and under the surface of the water to catch their prey.
Of course, if these birds spend most of their life on the ocean, they must be out there looking for something – in this case, they were hunting flying fish.
Let’s let that sink in for a second – these birds that can swim were hunting fish that can fly.
Both are a little out of their natural element, just doing what they have to do to survive. The birds would hover and strike when opportunity presented itself; they didn’t go chasing forever. Oftentimes, they would fail quickly, with the flying fish escaping underwater or flying off in a different direction than the bird was flying.
“Fail fast, fail forward” is something I have heard a lot the past few years, and it makes a lot of sense. We don’t need to pursue every opportunity; we need to wait for the right ones to come along so we can be in position to pounce.
Rest is absolutely key in between periods of hustle, but you also can’t give up trying. The bird would die, you would stagnate and your life would not improve.