As Robert Burns writes in To a Mouse, “The best laid plans of mice and men” often go ugly; and they do.

You and I plan poorly.

We create objectives, we create tasks to hit our objectives, we plan to reflect on our work and improve; but do we truly ever?

When Nature hurls chaos upon us, we often don’t know how to respond. We ask, How can this happen - all my best laid plans! In that moment of doubt, when our best laid plans “gang aft agly”, we need to become water.

Spend time in nature - especially near a creek. Watch how water effortlessly moves across and around obstacles. Let the sounds of water churning and swirling around rocks to enchant you. Think to yourself, how might I be more like water? How might my life go from being a hurricane to a soft churn and swirl as I move effortlessly around rocks and creek bends?

When our best laid plans go ugly and chaos reigns, effortlessly moving around that which gets in our way - like water - is the surest antidote to the stress caused by a fixed and vexed mind.