Something about turtles and being in the presence of the magic of turtle nests on a Florida beach is a heart send to me each summer. All of it glistening by moonlight and creating stories in the sunshine has me feel integrated to the secret mystery of our own everyday births and natural gifts.

To see a nest arise is to know that in every life there is both a sleeping and a stirring in the sands. The mama turtle arrives at an unknown time and with all her prehistoric greatness as mysteriously disappears back into her larger uterine sea. The nest patiently waits no matter the elements. It’s also enough power for them, even as fenceless eggs, that just the memory of the maternal imprint and starlight is there.

I recently met a lost newborn tyke at an unexpected turtle rescue. It was trapped deep in the nest still surviving on its yolk and then freed. It would also be more accurate to say that the rescued turtle, (who I named Merlin), is the one who, in fact rescued me. Yes, I love turtles.  I learn a lot from them.

Like perseverance is in the little things. That life is not a race. Even when it looks like one. That it’s good to know how to work in a team and good to know how to be on your own.

That you can’t look back. There’s no time. Even if you get lost, even if you don’t know the way, just tell yourself it’s okay and you will find it eventually, going forward.

That it’s a good thing to know you are not anything special or exceptional from anything or anyone else and that just surviving by doing your best you is what makes you amazing and what makes you stand out on its own.

(You even learn this about the turtles who didn’t make it. They are nothing less meaningful to the life cycle process and have counted just as much so one can make it.)

That life at its core energy and truth isn’t about proving yourself every step of the way. It’s about improving yourself, each step of the way. …

…Making it into a nest if you are so lucky, making it out of a nest if you are so lucky, trailblazing sand as a sole means to practice and work the muscles in your flippers, and making it into the ocean, if you are so lucky, if not successfully being that one in a thousand catching the Gulf Stream to mature more… each event is a learning process of improving yourself within the life law of averages, and nothing more.

That’s why we are here.

Turtles are terrifically brave and terrifically humble at the same time while heeding to their instinct. It’s the sweetest combination. The-just-do-my-best-me humility principle and staying true to your core alone is what makes them all show up and what makes the force of life amazing and the turtle itself amazing.

(Any way, if you look at it, there is no time for comparisons in this best life survival race either! It’s just the power of respecting we are all in this together and just be you!!)

It’s the in between that counts. Life is a long series of in between. And as tough as it is, it’s beautiful.

Let the force of life amaze you! You will automatically know your next step without second-guessing every time you do.

Just when you think you have arrived, a new journey of arrival begins. Accept it and just keep going so long as you are breathing. Without it, you can’t live to your best self well.

The mama and baby turtle journey reminds me that we can birth and hatch things when least expected, past any fear, and it will happen one day, if we just do our thing and stay in our flow.

And that …. it’s good … and it’s as much wise … to be soft inside to the events of the world but to still have a hard shell!

Photography by Marina Mashaal