Swimming against the stream

There's lots of change in the wind today; time to keep breathing, hold the tiller steady, and press on in hope.  But as Eugene Peterson says in Run with the Horses, "It is, of course, far easier to languish in despair than to live in hope, for when we live in despair we don't have to do anything or risk anything.  We can live lazily and shiftlessly with an untarnished reputation for practicality, current with the way things appear.  

It is fashionable to espouse the latest cynicism," he continues.  "If we live in hope, we go against the stream." I'm doing my best to go against the stream -- and beginning to understand why the salmon who finally arrive in our streams to spawn look so incredibly battered. But I still believe it's worth the trip...