You can't catch trout in a bathtub

Author

Jamil Vanheyningen
May 18, 2025

At each key crossroad in my life, I have found that while the choices may seem endless, the potential decisions fit into two main paths:

The right path or the easy path.

The right way usually involves more work and some sort of sacrifice, which is why it becomes “the road less traveled” as the poet Robert Frost put it.

The easy way, however, is a trap. It promises ease, but fails to warn you of the guilt and regret you will feel later when you realize that the easy path is always a short and uneventful one.

The late writer Norman Maclean and his brother Paul spent their youth learning how to fly fish from their father. In his novella “A River Runs Through It”, he recalls a conversation they had where his brother imparted some fishing advice that we can use when examining our own opportunities:

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“Brother,” he said, “You can’t catch trout in a bathtub.”

“You like to fish in sunny, open water because you are a Scot and afraid to lose a fly if you cast into the bushes. But the fish are not taking sunbaths. They are under the bushes where it is cool and safe from fishermen like you.” “I lose flies when I get mixed up in the bushes,” I complained.

“What the hell do you care?” he asked.

“We don’t pay for flies. George is always glad to tie more for us.”

“Nobody,” he said, “has put in a good day’s fishing unless he leaves a couple of flies hanging on the bushes. You can’t catch fish if you don’t dare go where they are.”

So many people are lonely (for example, the “male loneliness epidemic”) and yet they never reach out to others or share anything beyond a dull “good”, “it’s going”, or “I can’t complain”.

Others want to be famous or financially stable, and yet want to stop working the second things get hard or uncomfortable. It reminds me of the saying the entrepreneur Alex Hormozi repeats: “This is what ‘hard’ feels like.”

If you aren’t vulnerable with yourself or others, you’re bound to be lonely.

If you shrink away the second the work gets hard, you will never be successful.

If you keep your line out in the open water, you’re not where the fish are.

You’re wasting your time trying to catch trout in a bathtub.

The throughline here is that being your best self means finding the comfort in exposing yourself.

“I lose flies when I get mixed up in the bushes,” is how you sound when you complain about your failures.

You’re going to lose more than you win.

In fact, if you have no failures or wrecks to show for yourself lately, you’re leaving so much potential untapped.

“We don’t pay for flies,” Paul told his brother, and likewise, our mistakes only cost us some pride and time.

In short, go to where the fish are and don’t be afraid to lose some flies. Losing is the only indicator that you’re trying.

“Nobody has put in a good day’s fishing unless he leaves a couple of flies hanging on the bushes. You can’t catch fish if you don’t dare go where they are.”

Put yourself in the right environments to win and don’t be afraid to lose some. Just like people will remember the massive fish you caught and not the hours you spent without so much as a bite, no one will remember your losses like they remember your wins.