Life on an island

A friend suddenly experienced a whole lot of bad luck which presented many problems with not knowing which way to turn.

After a chat he said he felt as though he was alone on an island with nowhere to go. Haven’t we all been there at some time in our lives?

What do you do when you find yourself in that situation? My answer would be to imagine that you really are on an island and go through the pros and cons of being on an island.

What kind of island is it? 

• A desert island, with plenty of sand sea and sunshine.

• An island in a cooler climate, with sand, sea and sunshine but not very warm.

• An island in the middle of a wide river which has a fast flowing and dangerous current.

• On a desert island, you will feel warm and a bit like being on holiday with no friends. There will be the soothing sound of the waves from the sea, palm trees and quite a bit of habitation. This will be OK for a short while but soon you will feel trapped. You might even experience a tropical storm.

• On an island in a cooler climate you will still have the sea but the waves will be stormier and you will feel the cold. There will be trees and habitation. Again you will feel trapped and need somewhere to shelter from the cold winds.

• On an island in the middle of a river, it will be smaller, there will be lots of habitation and you will be constantly watching the river roaring passed. Feeling trapped and wondering if a boat did pass by, would it be able to stop to pick you up? Swimming to the bank of the river would be too dangerous.

Whatever island you are on the main objective is to get off. So how will you go about it?

Firstly, assess the situation, look at the problems you face before you are able to leave. 

• How easy is it to get around the island? How many stumbling blocks are in my way?

• How long will my mobile signal last? How am I going to contact someone to help me?

• Have I got enough clothing if it is cold? What will I do if I am too hot or too cold?

• How do I eat? How will I survive?

• Do I just wait for a boat to come along and pick me up?

Having looked at these points, you can only guess how long it will take you to get off and back to a normal happy life because these things depend so much on how you tackle the problem and, to some extent, luck. If you never try to tackle a problem and wait for luck, you may never get to where you want to be.

What strategy am I going to undertake when the stumbling blocks arise?

Do I sit and feel sorry for myself hoping that by magic something will come up?

Shall I have a plan of action?

How determined am I to get to where I want to be?

Am I going to sit and wait until a boat comes by?

Once you have thought the problem through, relate these to how you are going to cope if you are not on an island but just feel you are. If you are on your own, the only person who can help you is YOU but you could find some friends you could mull things over with, have a journey plan for when the boat arrives, keep a positive attitude, see every hurdle as one than CAN be climbed over.

The moral of the story is that there is always a way of getting off the island; YOU just have to find it!