There comes a moment in every journey when the horizon narrows. When the light dims not out of cruelty, but because you’ve stepped into depth. This was Agua—no longer the shimmer of dreaming, but the weight of becoming. Here, the path grew steep. Each idea once feather-light now asked for form, for discipline, for the slow and silent courage of staying. It wasn’t the flood that threatened me, but the long climb beneath it. Every step forward meant shedding something—fear, expectation, the comfort of not knowing. Creation began to cost something real.
Water, in psychology, is emotion in its most honest form. In Agua, I met the full range of mine. The excitement of beginnings gave way to fatigue. Resistance arrived in quiet waves: hesitation, imposter thoughts, the ache of comparison. But beneath it all, something deeper stirred. Carl Rogers once said that “the curious paradox is that when I accept myself just as I am, then I can change.” And so, I learned to swim with my doubt, not against it. To let emotion move through me like tide—not to drown me, but to teach me how to breathe underwater.
When the ascent steepened, I realized I couldn’t run on passion alone. I needed rhythm. I needed rest. The fire that once lit the way had to be preserved, protected, fed with intention. I leaned into practice—not perfection. I stopped chasing clarity and began cultivating faith. That every obstacle was carving me, shaping me to hold the very thing I longed to build. That discomfort was not a sign to stop—but a signal I was entering a new terrain. Steepness means height. And height means view.
Agua asked me to soften without collapsing. To persist without force. To hold vision even when the mirror fogged. This was no longer a dream—it was a devotion. In the stillness between effort and exhaustion, I heard something subtle rise again. A pulse. A memory of the flame from Fuego. A whisper that reminded me why I began. And so, drenched and raw, I climbed. The path was steep. But I was becoming strong enough to hold what I’d asked for.
