Fly Fishing and Existentialism

Sartre said that by writing he was existing. Relating this to fly fishing my thought is that there are fly fishers who might in a similar manner claim they exist by fly fishing. 

I can look back to the pond I fished as a kid and make a similar conclusion. By fly fishing at a pond, I existed.  And in the years after the pond, I continued to need fly fishing mainly on the South Platte River where I existed as a guide.

Soren Kierkegaard added a religious component to his own existence and to his ideas on existentialism. He thought that until a person becomes deeply religious and authentic, we simply are not serious individuals. It is like playing Christianity or playing around with our lives and taking neither seriously.

What I appreciate about this type of Christianity combined with existentialism is that it forces the individual to take responsibility for his/her life and his/her choices. We can’t just dump all our problems on God and refuse to take responsibility. We have to choose but we choose while deeply aware of God watching us. Together, the individual and his awareness of God, becomes serious.

William Barrett described this seriousness in this way, “It is the simple and forthright seriousness of someone who at last has arrived at his center and who is therefore totally engaged in the project of his life and with all that entails. The person exists under the eye of eternity and therefore what he does in the moment is absolutely real.”

The choice to walk to the pond was real. I chose the path in a moment of time.  It felt weighty in that moment and to follow that path had a price because I chose to be more or less alone. In looking back at that loneliness, it now feels glorious, especially in comparison to all the crowds I now experience on the river. Oh, how I would love to be alone, or at least somewhat alone now on the South Platte River. I doubt such loneliness will ever return to the South Platte.

The eyes of eternity were upon me and I could feel their weight. The eyes of eternity were also upon me every day I guided the past 35 years and are upon me now as I try to adjust to booming guiding businesses and crowds on the river.

This will be a big adjustment for me to make.

What is the greater challenge? Being alone? Or being part of the crowds?

Or, feeling alone within the crowds.