Thoughts about COVID-19 and Fishing
There is an old fishing joke that goes something like this; When John died and arrived at the pearly gates he was amazed. He had lived a rough life and figured he would end up in hell, not in heaven. Peter was at the gate to greet him and asked him what he would like heaven to be. John thought about it for a minute and said: “I want to be in a beautiful river where I catch a big fish on every cast.” Peter opened the gate and let John in. As he stepped inside he found himself in a beautiful river with a rod in his hands. He makes a cast and lo and behold he’s got a big fish on. He lands the fish and makes another cast. Sure enough he catches another big fish. This goes on for a while and pretty soon John starts tiring from catching all these big fish. However, when he wants to go to shore he can’t. He is stuck in the river and has no choice but to keep on fishing and catching big fish. After days of doing this John realizes he is in Hell after all.
For me, as a fisherman, I have lived this scenario, and I have been fortunate to do so and learn from it that catching fish, or more fish, is not the essence of fishing. Many anglers are strongly motivated by catching fish. It is understandable that if one does not have the opportunity to catch fish on a regular basis that we start to covet catching fish. This is not only true for fishing and holds up for other aspects of life, bigger car, more money, bigger house, etc. The challenge is to clearly see that the catching of the fish is not the essence of what brings happiness. The essence of happiness is how the mind perceives the experience.
Years ago I was on a trip with my wife in a remote area of northern Tanzania. We met a young Maasai man and stayed with him a few days. He was a very cheerful happy young man with a positive outlook on life. On the second day he asked me how much a watch like I had would cost him. I told him that it would cost him around thirty dollars. His happy demeanor immediately deflated and he was clearly very disappointed that he would never be able to afford this. The fascinating part for me was that he really had no use for the watch. He had been fine without it, getting up at dawn and getting ready for the evening at dusk.
To me, pictures of big fish are like that watch. For most of us these fish are unattainable and looking at pictures of them leads to coveting that what is not within our reach, and ultimately, to unhappiness. The successful angler is not the person who catches a big fish at an expensive remote lodge, the successful angler is he who is happy looking at the lake, staring at his bobber and sharing a lunch with his best friend, then, after catching nothing, goes home and feels that he had a great day.
The good news is that we can train our minds to learn to appreciate the experience while not catching any fish. Many books are written on this, often in context of philosophies of life or religion, indicating that this is a core value that has been troubling humans for a long time.
I spent a big part of my life guiding for steelhead and every guide knows that guiding is just as much about knowing people as that it is knowing fish. The goal in guiding is often catching fish, however I have learned that many anglers can have a very enjoyable day without catching fish. The pace of the fishing, camaraderie, the surrounding nature, the aspect of learning and discovering things all contribute to a wonderful day. Catching a fish is just and extra bonus!
In this day and age of ever diminishing natural resources there has been a trend towards competition over those limited resources. In the case of fishing I have seen, over my lifetime, a strong trend towards competitiveness, a lack of sharing and a strong trend towards monetization of the resource. Ironically what this leads to is that angling is starting to look more and more like our daily lives of hustle and bustle, while our initial intent in angling is to find some peace and rest.
Moving towards a solution for this is not easy and I believe is not possible by regulation. The solution for this has to come from our mindset in regards to angling as it was meant to be; the peaceful, contemplative experience of discovery of our surroundings and ourselves.
I am writing this article during the social isolation period of the COVID-19 pandemic. It seems to me that we all realize that the earth has slowly been pushed to the limits of its capacity and that this pandemic is just another sign that we have to make changes in order to survive on this planet. I believe we can, and I believe it starts with a shift in our mindset towards caring more about the experience of angling than about catching more fish.
