The River's Parable

The river's purpose is not to reach the ocean or lake. And for it to die there. That is because its work is done along its journey as it travels downward but it is not about reaching  a destination.  

I paraphrased that from somewhere I read a while back but didn't quite get what context it was trying to convey. Indeed, is the river's aim then  not on where it will end but what it does along the way? I see the parable of the river of life upon which all of us are a part of.

So we begin with, "Why do we have rivers in the first place?"

Unless one lives along a river bank, or on a river cruise along the Danube, the Mississippi or the Yellow river or the Mekong, or watching the news on flood disasters, rivers do not pre-occupy one's thoughts.  Let's for a moment focus on it.

Let's see. We have rivers because we have mountains and hills. And  we ask, "Why do we have mountains in the first place?"

It took a lot of energy over eons of time to create mountains and hills alongside them. Undersea volcanic eruptions gave rise to islands, plate tectonic collisions caused lands to rise up and it is still going on today. The Himalayan mountain range, where Mt. Everest is a part of, is one great example of two tectonic plates pushing against each other to create the peaks we see today. Mt. Everest is still growing at 2 millimeters per year. Major rivers that include the Indus and Ganges and the Yangtse are fed by the Himalayan mountains from both sides that provide water to China and India and several other countries.

The forces that build up a mountain are stored as potential energy in every drop of water on top and along the mountainside for every foot that it is  above sea level.  Water will always flow to the lowest level so it is the difference between where it is coming from to the lowest possible level it can go to that defines its potential energy. It is from that where a river converts it to kinetic energy as it surges downward. We see that energy in action in waterfalls, the rapids, and the devastation caused by floods.

The other amazing thing is that the river's kinetic energy can be stored  by damming it, thus effectively converting it to potential energy contained in a dam until water is released to run turbines to produce electricity via hydroelectric generators as in the Hoover Dam and the three Gorges Dam in China.

Rivers, history tells us, were instrumental in the development of early civilization. 

Mesopotamia, from Greek which means between two rivers - the Tigris and Euphrates - is known as the cradle of civilization. Everywhere we look around the globe human settlements grew at the mouth of rivers before emptying to the open sea or lakes. Note that from the left corner of the map below, we see another pivotal location in ancient history - the Nile Delta that is the area before the river empties into the Mediterranean.  The region called the Fertile Crescent is bound by the three rivers of the Nile, Tigris and Euphrates.

Rivers are not just carriers of energy from the highest mountain peaks to the sea but the first conduit for mass transport of goods and people.  Even more important is that rivers actually move nutrients from the foot of mountains to the river banks. Early agriculture and human development flourished on the plains near and along rivers. Flooding is actually a river's chore as an annual clean up event at the same time  to replenish the nutrients along the river banks.  "The annual flooding of the Nile River dates back to ancient times when civilizations used its waters to nourish their crops. This flooding is of great importance to the livelihood and ecology of the region. It is known as the Nile flood and is an integral part of the historical legacy of Egypt and Sudan". The annual inundation is a celebrated event to this day.

The Parable of the River

It is the river from which we may extract moral and spiritual guideposts in our journey through our own personal river of life where indeed it is not where we end up but what we've accomplished along the way.

Anyone of us had the same potential energy at birth as in every droplet of water from the mountain top, allegorically speaking that is.  Our life's journey proceeds with the arrow of time that only goes  forward in the same way that the river flows only in one direction.  It is therefore what we do and how we navigate ourselves along the way that makes up the story of our lives. It is not  merely about striving to arrive at a destination but it is about how we spend every moment along the way.

Every river at its origin begins from tiny droplets that converge to make a thin rivulet. Rivulets converge to form narrow tributaries that soon join to make a stream.  Streams join up to make a river. That also describes our lives from the moment of conception, to our birth, growing up and making our way through life.

Both the river and each of our lives would  seem to be hostages of the arrow of time but time is also the enabler of growth and the facilitator of our journey. Time means we have to look forward and like the river there is no going back. Like the river we go through life rushing to grow up from childhood to the teenage years in a hurry to adulthood.  Along the way, we went through the rough rapids, then the calm serene flow of a widening river, then to rush again through the narrows  but that is how it is to be alive, to feel alive. Some of us may have gone through a waterfall - an illness, a breakup, a failed business - and survive it. The river continues. Along its way, the river carries with it nutrients from the soil above to be dropped off to the river banks. 

That is the parable of the river. We go on that journey from where ever it was we came from, from whenever it was, but in our journey we've affected others along the way as we had been affected by those ahead of us - parents, teachers, our elders, etc., but always mindful that the arrow of time only goes one way. We "drop off" what we can along the way - helping a friend, a neighbor, a loved one who had fallen on hard times and every ounce of kindness to the less fortunate among us, even to strangers - because, as with the river, it is not about reaching the open sea but what it does along the way.

And you know what, even the open sea or lake may not be the end for the river after all. Some of the water evaporates to become clouds that soon come down as rain over the mountains, some freeze to become snow caps. Then the droplets including those from the snow melt will begin the new season and thus  the cycle starts all over again. So even as much of the water remains at sea or lake, a good part of it goes up into the clouds and comes down again. That is the river's parable.