A blog about appreciation, Wherever you go, there you are, and You choose.

Going to Bimini to swim with wild dolphins isn’t anything like going to other places where you slip in to a lagoon where there are a few dolphins penned in and you can touch them and feed them fish. In Bimini, at least with the group we went with, you’re looking for wild dolphins. As in, you’re out in the middle of the ocean trolling around on a boat hoping to see them. When you do, you carefully slip in to the water and snorkel around a bit waiting to see if they engage with you. NEVER the other way around. (As they said every day on the boat, “Rule #1, DON’T TOUCH THE DOLPHINS!”) In other words, there is absolutely no guarantee that you will ever see dolphins. We were fortunate in our group because the folks that took us out every day are connected with an organization called the Dolphin Communication Project (www.dolphincommunicationproject.org) so they’ve been studying dolphins in the area for close to 20 years and have really gotten to know their habits and patterns. But again, no guarantees.
Based on the dolphins we saw during the week, I’d say, we had a pretty successful trip. Yet, there was one day where we didn’t see a fin. Nothing. For approximately 4 ½ hours on a boat, we saw nothing. As I mentioned in an earlier blog, we were with a group of about 10, all very different. It was a pretty cool dynamic actually. But I could definitely tell that some needed to see and swim with the dolphins and a ‘shut out’ day was not an option. AND, I could feel myself starting to get sucked in to that energy. On that day, I could feel myself starting to get a bit pissy about not seeing any. Like, ‘What the heck! Here I am in the middle of the ocean looking for dolphins after coming all the way down here to swim with them, and wow, there aren’t any today!’ But the second I felt that energy entering my space, I stopped and started laughing. Because, yes, here I was sitting on a boat in the middle of this indescribably beautiful water (seriously you can’t even articulate the color of this water…), in this incredibly beautiful place, rocking gently, feeling a little breeze on my face, feeling the sun, talking and laughing with new friends, and learning about dolphins from the crew and interns that were with us. And I instantly felt this amazing wave of appreciation for all of it. Even without dolphins, it was an awesome day. My lesson? Wherever you go, there you are.
It’s how you choose to look at your situation that makes all the difference.
Live and learn in Munay.