Crossing the Flood
SN 1.1 Ogha-taraṇa Sutta: Crossing the Flood
A devata, a very beautiful, female ‘demi-God’, asks the Buddha “How did you cross the flood?”. She means the ‘flood’ of cyclic existence in samsara.
The Buddha replies “By not halting, friend, and by not straining I crossed the flood. […] When I came to a standstill then I sank, but when I struggled I got swept away.”