I was walking along a frozen beach the other day.
Snow covered everything. Ice glazed the sand. The only places that seemed remotely safe to step were the footprints left by people who had walked there before me. Their steps had already crushed through the frozen, salty, sandy surface.
At first, I felt grateful for that.
When I looked ahead, it appeared that a clear path had already been made, and I wouldn’t have to work so hard or be quite so careful. There was a sense of relief in believing the way forward had already been solved.
So, I stepped into those footprints.
But it didn’t take long to notice that what looked supportive from a distance was not as solid as I had imagined. The footprints weren’t made for my body, or my stride, or the way my weight naturally shifts and balances. My feet didn’t land cleanly inside the prints.
It also became clear that these steps were not fresh.
Snow had begun to fill them in. Wind and water had softened some places and hardened others, and the crust around the edges had collapsed in spots or sharpened from exposure. What I thought would be an easier walk turned out to require just as much effort (if not more) than forging my own way.
And yet, there was something instructive in it...
By staying present and adjusting in real time, I could use the general direction of the path without surrendering myself to it completely. Each step asked for attention and sensitivity. For willingness to release my expectations about how smooth or effortless the walk should be.
This felt like a living metaphor for so many paths we walk in life.
Training paths. Professional paths. Spiritual paths.
Very few of us are truly walking where no one has gone before. There is wisdom in honoring those who came ahead of us. There is value in learning from their experience, their insights, and their hard earned understanding.
But there is also a subtle trap here.
Their footsteps are not our footsteps.
Their stride is not our stride.
Their way of moving through the world is not the same as ours.
When we mistake their footprints for our own, we can begin to believe that something is wrong with us when we do not fit neatly into the path that already exists. We can confuse guidance with conformity. Reverence with self-erasure.
Walking any meaningful path requires awareness of what we uniquely bring to it. It asks us to honor our own body, our own rhythm, and our own knowing, just as much as we honor those who helped shape the way.
And when we hold both with care, the path itself begins to soften.
There are moments when we naturally step slightly to the side. Moments when we just cannot stay inside the established footprints. Moments when a detour is not a mistake, but a necessary adjustment in order to stay upright, alive, and true.
From close up, it can look like deviation.
But from a wider view, it is simply movement responding to conditions.
And if we zoom out far enough, something even more curious reveals itself:
There is really no path at all.
There is only life unfolding itself in real time. Only movement happening. Only awareness interpreting that movement as a path being traveled.
From this perspective, the path is pathless.
Always has been.
And still, we walk.
Carefully.
Attentively.
Gratefully.
One step at a time.