Pura Vida!

At first Glance, Samara is a sleepy fishing village on the Nicoya Peninsula of Costa Rica. With a three-mile beach, horseshoe bay, four restaurants, an internet cafe, a supermarket and a noisy upstairs bar, the town seemed too tiny to be interesting for longer than a night or two. Tim and I stopped a local woman and asked where we could find tacos. "Tacos? Traditional Costa Rican Food? You cannot find that here. There are no traditional restaurants in town, just the Spanish place and the Italians with their pizza." She told us. "But I recommend that you try the Organic Foods store and thier restraunt around the corner. They are two blocks away at what we call the gym."

With bright green walls, and a green metal fence surrounding, the gym is one city block of bliss. Two American couples have recently relocated to Samara and have added to it what they would like in a town: an organic food store, a health-conscious restaurant, a massage hut and a local farmers market every Friday.

As we strolled into the farmers market, we quickly spotted the two American couples, and six other booths of local residents with crepes, cheeses, vegetables, smoothies, hummus and honey. I started a conversation with a tan elderly man at his hummus stand. He quickly switched from my Spanish to English and I heard a note of New York in his voice. His bright blue eyes sparkled as he told me his story of moving to Costa Rica five years ago, becoming healthy, and losing 110 pounds. He showed me an 8x10 photo of his former self to illustrate.

"That's fantastic!" I told him, "You essentially lost me!"

We laughed for a while and I basked in his glow: a mix of healthy, grateful and Pura Vida.

'Pura Vida' is an expression used in Costa Rica that means as many things as Aloha does in the Hawaiian Islands. In Spanish, ‘Pura Vida’ translates to ‘Pure Life’. But more than a life unclouded, down there it means ‘Enjoy Life.’ Do what you want to do most with it, enjoy every day, savor the good stuff and be sure to allow yourself plenty of good stuff.
While purchasing organic carrots and cucumber to use in the hummus, I met another man, John, an artist who has also relocated from the states and has lived in Samara for a week.

Why Costa Rica? It all started when his 26 year old daughter asked to put in a CD. He resisted her music choice until she gave the disclaimer of "Dad, if you don't like it, I will take it out. Just try it."

The CD turned out to be Jack Johnson, singing lullabies and melodies about priorities other than the 9 to 5, about an easy going style of life, about following what makes you happy and realizing that all you need is within yourself. An instant resonance with these themes led John to view Johnson's surf movies, seek out surf spots, and eventually end up on this beach here in Costa Rica.

When John told his family he was moving out of the country, they were not supportive. Rather than seeing what this move was to John, his daughter focused on how it would affect her.

"Why would you leave me?" She asked.

"I am not leaving you. You can come down and visit anytime." John explained. "But I need to do this for me. I want out of the rat race. And I am inspired down there." His daughter did not understand, and was unhappy with his choice. But in time, that may fade.

John's story was a beautiful reminder to me that I cannot make everyone happy, and if I am to make anyone happy, I have got to start with myself. Others may not understand or support a different lifestyle, or a giant life change. They may say they are unhappy with a choice. But it is my responsibility to do what I need to do to be happy, to enjoy my life. They have the same responsibility for their own happiness. Rather that comes with eating a diet of raw fruits and vegetables, deciding to not be a lawyer anymore and switching to painting for a living, relocating to a place your family has never heard of, or simply eating more tomatoes, you have to listen to your heart and go forward and - Pura Vida - enjoy life!

Returning to the United States from Costa Rica, our Customs and Border Patrol check was in Houston. Cold and hungry off the first of three planes and relying on my tan for warmth, I approached the Customs Official.

"Good Morning!" I said, holding out my passport and immigration form.

"What countries have you visited?" He asked.

"Costa Rica," I told him.

"What was the purpose of your trip?" He asked

"To play." I said, smiling.

"Define play." He said.

I stared at him, searching for a hint of a smile or a crinkle of the eye to tell me he was joking. He wasn’t.

As I fumbled for a response, the official asked in a monotone voice, "To play the guitar? To play the flute? You must be more specific."

"You know, play. As in: fun, enjoyment. As in: life’s a game."

"No." he said, staring darkly at me. "I don’t know."

Obviously, I thought, but bit my tongue.

He moved right along. "You have no bags?"

"No checked bags." I motioned. "Just the backpack."

"No bags?" he asked again.

"Not even a guitar." I said. The official didn’t respond or smile, he just slammed his stamp down on the immigration form and handed back my passport. Oooooookay then.

I chose to see the situation as funny, laughing as I boarded the escalator. Define play. If you really need a definition, are you enjoying life? Back in the United States, Pura Vida seemed a rare concept within the hurried lifestyle, serious tone, sparse vacations, and focus on productivity over enjoyment.

As I look back over our two weeks in Costa Rica, I see plenty of play: climbing trees, squishing through a rainforest in mud boots (complete with sound affects), jumping off five waterfalls, giggling into shore on warm waves and howling back at monkeys. It’s the newness and joy that I not only live for, but it’s also how I live. It is my version of Pura Vida: planning another trip while on a journey, exploring possibilities, living big, learning about the landscapes within myself and others, learning new languages and new ways to enjoy life.

The Fall

I leaned over the wooden platform on shaky legs and peered over the edge of the 170 foot waterfall. Adrenaline and excitement made my heart pound in my head. The guide waved up at me from the rocks below, but he was just a tiny spec, an ant, a blur through the spray and mist. I took a deep breath and began my long descent towards him with one giant backwards leap.

The thing I love best about rappelling has nothing to do with the tight harness, the nifty knots, or the gear. It has nothing to do with a series of gorgeous waterfalls or the vibrant jungle zooming past. And oddly enough, it has little to do with the adrenaline The thing I love best about rappelling is that you have to let go in order to move forward.

If I hold the rope tightly to my right side, I am stalled, dangling 169 feet up, at birds eye level. In order to go down, I have to let loose with my grip so that the rope can burn past my palm and through my caribeaner device to slide me down.

To start the game, I have to bend my knees and push off the platform, take a leap of trust and literally let go to fall out into thin air and falling water. Thirty feet down, my shoes hit the wet rock wall and I struggled to find traction so that I could leap out again in order to fall away from the rock face and not scrape down on it. I suppose this is controlled falling. As controlled as a tiny river canyon buried in the rain forest jungle can be. I laughed out loud as the waterfall thundered on my helmet and shoulders. Several leaps later, my feet finally landed on terra firma, and I stood on wobbly legs and watched the others follow suit. The more they clenched the rope and clung, the more stuck they became, the less they allowed themselves to more forward.

When they were so tightly attached, their fear multiplied and escalated almost instantly. That 170 feet of space in between two solid locations could be terrifying, or it could be the most fun part of the experience depending on how playful the rappelers were and how much they allowed themselves to let go. One woman gripped too tightly and became paralyzed one third of the way down. She fought and screamed and hyperventilated and dramatized. I guess that is an option. Not everyone can embrace the sensation and keep moving forward. One thing's for certain however, if you leap, you have got to be ready, you have got to have trust, and you've got to let go.

That leap of faith is a rush, for certain. It is the epitome of going for it, just doing it, and making things happen. We all have points in our lives where we are standing on that platform, looking far out into the abyss at what we want, where we want to go. In order to get to what we want, we have to leave what we no longer want. This platform can be many things: a lifestyle, a location, a relationship, a habit, or even a career.

There was no way to choose a route to fall over the waterfall. I couldn't plan where my feet would land on the wet rock, nor how many leaps would take me to the pool below. I just had to believe I could do this, trust that the "how" would work itself out and know that if I would let go and leap I could get there.

When I think back in my life to all the leaps I have made, it has always worked out in the end. Sometimes the space between, the unknown, the fall, has been longer than 170 feet, but I have always been okay.

Hours of jumping and leaping and falling and woo-hooing later, I was more comfortable with letting go of the rope and going with the flow. I started to play with how far I could jump out off the platforms, how long I could stand on the vertical rock wall in the middle of each waterfall and admire the view from the cliff face while I was there. The last waterfall was 90 feet and I was wishing there were 5 more falls below it. Being comfortable to play with the unknown, I hooked into the rope, turned around backwards and without hesitation leapt into space, knowing it was not only going to be okay, it was going to be fantastic fun!

Liquid Joy

The gravel is sharp and painful under the bare soles of our feet as we enter the jungle corridor to the ocean. I am wishing my reach was just an inch longer to comfortably tuck the 8 foot surf board under my arm. On land, I am a little too little to carry this board. I glance only breifly at the sharp thorned branches of the Intimacy trees and walk on, trusting my timid steps will be safe from harm. Under the last tree we pass, a mother and her daughter sit with a dark monkey looking down at them. My steps quicken as the cooridor opens to the expanse of the sea.

The board that was so cumbersome and awkward on land instantly becomes part of me in the ocean. I put on its leash and we stroll into the waist high water. The waves have a high frequency but are smaller than during my thrashing this morning. Tim and I join a dozen other surfers walking our boards out in the ocean. The farther out we walk, the longer of a ride we will have back to the shore. There are too many waves to paddle through, so I form my own style of gripping the board, pushing down on the side of it to stabalize as a wave hits, breathing out slowly so that the water that crashes repeately over my head does not enter my lungs. Its a silly game: five steps forward and a wave pushes me back three, my toes trailing in the sand like anchors, fighing the tide.

Then, there is a break, and no waves are forming to come towards me and I know it is time. I climb on and begin to paddle forward. The sound of rushing water grows louder behind me as a new wave approaches and chooses to pick me up and take me with it. Suddenly, I have speed. I am zooming along the top of a foam pile. Seizing the opportunity, I pop up, and with arms out, regain balance. And I fly forward, no longer fighting the waves but joining them. Squealing with laughter at the mix of speed and delight, I glance over to see Tim sharing the experience. Then the shore approaches, the shallows rise up and I hop off only to turn around and start the game all over again.

At one point, I wondered what I was doing out there. I was watching these tan boys with shoulder length hair and tv worthy abs ride these big waves cresting over thier heads. They zoomed right at me, right by me. It was surreal, like being in a surf movie. One man jumped off the very top of a wave, his board arching up into the air, out of control and at dangerous speed. Others dove down to avoid being hit when it sliced into the sea. I reminded myself that this was one of those sports where people of all skill levels could be out on the same day and still have fun. And up until that moment of consciousness, I really had been comfortable with the height of the waves, thier speed and depth.

What was I doing out here? Having a grand time, that's what.

The sun neared us, turning the water into liquid joy. I laughed and sputtered out sea water and dove more. The waves turned to crimson and the bright orb of the backlit sun caught the curling crests making the sand in them glisten. I was getting tired. The moon grew brighter as it pulled light from the setting sun. Likewise, the waves grew bigger and more pushy as the sea pulled energy and effort from my body.

Finally it was down to the one last glowing sunset wave. I giggled the entire ride in to shore. I felt like I wanted to thank the sea, buy her flowers, send her hand-written thank you cards, sing her praises in my natural high. Tim and I followed six other exhaused happy surfers heading for the cooridor, the wet sand beneath us turning to pink glass in the fading light.

The Lesson of the Day is Kindness

It is my belief that we all too often assume that things will stay this way forever, just as we assume that who we are is limited to some little voice in our brains. And yet, the only constant of life is change. Those players in our game who pass through our little window of vision today may not be back tomorrow. If we believe that we are simply watching behind that window, then we are forever keeping the soul caged by our ignorance.

If we treated everyone we met today as though we would not see them tomorrow, we could pull all of our relationships into the present moment. This way, we would not be living with the grudges of what happened in this relationship months ago, but actually see the person standing before us now. And taking this one step further, we might seize the moment by making the effort to give them love, show them kindness and voice how much they mean to us.

During one of my shifts at the café this week, around lunch time, a little man came in who appeared to be in his seventies or eighties. “I’m here for lunch.” he announced. “Where are your sandwiches?”

My heart sank at that, for we had been out of bread for days and our sandwich case was empty. He kept talking. “Well, you can make them up fresh, right? I will have a ham and cheese.”

“We are out of sandwiches.” I told him. “But I am happy to recommend a good place just across the street called Plankers.”

“Planters?” I realized he could not hear me clearly and switched to my Big Girl Voice.

“There is a sandwich shop across the street called Plankers. They have great sandwiches. You should try there.” I said loudly.

“Where?”

“Go across the street, turn right and down about five businesses.”

With a heavy sigh, he put on his gloves and jacket and left as the next customer stepped up to order coffee.

About ten minutes later, my same little old gentleman was back, with a concerned look on his face.

“There is no such place!" He said, exasperated. "I went down that street and I didn’t see any Planeers Sandwiches.” Reading his eyes, I saw hunger and frustration. I looked around. The café was full, but the lunch rush was over and our influx was lessening. There was time.

“I will be right back.” I told my coworker. Then I stepped out around the counter, playfully extended my elbow and said loudly so he could hear me, “Let’s go to lunch, bud.” The old man grinned and took my arm. We crossed the street, turned right and went down five doors to Plankers Sandwich Shop.

“I can’t actually stay and have lunch with you because I am technically still working, but I wanted to be sure you were fed.” I explained. People in the shop looked up because I was talking so loudly. “They do an amazing BLT here! Have a great lunch and you know I expect a full report later.” I gave him a hug and briskly walked back to the café.

Working in the coffee shop, I try to treat every interaction as the one of the day. How can I make this person smile? How can I show them that I care? Can I anticipate their needs and make their day better? How can I be present to the people I love in my life and let them know?

If I stretch that motto bigger, how can I treat this life as the one and only? I choose to live bigger than the ‘9 to 5, have dinner, go to bed, do it all over again tomorrow’ pattern. I work towards leaving the country so I may stretch my mind with new cultures, new ideas, new languages, new territories with foreign ecosystems. To go play with the eagles under a parachute, to swim after giant eagle rays out into the expanse of the sea, to keep climbing back on that surfboard when I have sand in every orifice but I know this next wave will be mine. Newness in my life is not a new pair of 300 dollar boots. Newness to me is boarding the night train and waking up in a different country.

One of my new favorite visuals is the photo of the guru Swami Satchitananda balancing on a surfboard, riding a blue Hawaiian wave with his long beard waving and his orange robes flowing out behind him. Below the photo is the caption: “You can’t stop the waves but you can learn how to surf.”

Change is coming, change is already here. I cannot stop it, but I can wake up and learn how to play in the moment I have. I want to be awake when I walk back through the park to my car after work. I want to be present to the trees in their Fall orange robes, to notice the frost patterns on crunchy leaves underneath my feet, to be open to loving more fully, to learning all I can, not thinking of budgeting, bills, schedules or taking the car in for a tune-up. Opportunities pass and I shall not choose to wait until I am retired to go play around the globe. I am living my dreams now to keep them alive, not taking the chance that they might drown in the sea of mundane day to day tasks while I wait for the right time. To be present is to assume responsibility for being here and now in this beautiful world in this incredible moment and make every act count. You can only do that if you are awake, if you are paying attention.

I don’t want to be one of the robots that goes through the same motions day to day, doing just enough to get by, saying just what I have to say to move through to the next customer. Where is the depth in that? Where is the learning? This life is a classroom where most of the students don’t even attempt the assignments, nor write the papers or read the lesson textbooks or look inside and paint the pictures of what they see. Because most of those students don’t see the opportunity to learn in their given situation. And they surely don’t get that they are also the teacher setting the syllabus.

The little man I had helped returned to the café with a full stomach and a smile. He came back just to tell me how tasty his BLT sandwich had been, and when he asked if I had eaten yet, he offered me his other half.

The lesson of the day is Kindness.

The Closed Fist

This week of being alive, I have been reminded to never assume. When coffee shop customers are demanding and short with me or are repeatedly negative, I usually assume they are being this way out of spite, and my mind places them on the “mean” list. And yet, it takes some people, especially those that are older and very attached to their routine, longer to warm up to people. Honestly, it took one couple four months before they would talk to me. They came in for coffee every day but would order, pay and walk away, not even answering “How are you today?“ or “How was your weekend.“ Just because they are closed doesn’t mean they are grumpy. Flowers are always more fun to interact with, but tightly clasped buds hold the potential to be beautiful as well.

One woman in particular, Sandy, seemed to be very demanding, always reminding me of the specifications of how she liked her latte, getting upset with me if I did not remember her last name (as if I do not deal with hundreds of customers’ first and last names on a daily basis). It seemed to me that she was looking for what was wrong in the situation. Sandy is the one to point out that the expiration date has passed on her milk, to point out the coffee rings on the dirty counter, and bring to my attention that there was entirely too much flavor in her latte. She would double check that it was sugar free, did hear her say she wanted sugar free? And by the way, there is an ugly bug crawling across your counter!

Two days ago, there was not a line in the coffee shop when Sandy came in, and there was more time to interact. By now, I do know how to spell her last name, (that’s e-w, not e-u) and I can make her drink with just the right amount of sugar free vanilla with a milk that has months to go before expiring. But I was on the register, ringing in her order and someone else had the task of making her drink. And we started talking. She actually asked me a personal question about myself. I have nothing to hide and answered honestly, which must have opened a door for suddenly we were in a deep conversation about change. She was telling me about how her son does not like change. How he dug his heels in and resisted when he was 8 years old and they were moving into a new house. I mentioned that it interested me how personality attributes like that cross over into children’s adult lives as they grow older and asked if he got better with change or if that manifested into the life he lives now. And she said, “You mean, you don’t know?”

“Know what?” I asked.

“My son was killed in Iraq.” At those words, there was a buzz in my ears that became deafening and I felt pushed back, pushed down, and in that moment, my eyes cleared and I realized why Sandy is the way she is. Her behavior towards me and others suddenly made perfect sense. Yes, I had heard of the death of the young marine with that same last name, spelled e-w not e-u. He is something of a small town hero here. But I had no clue he was her son. I was overwhelmed by compassion for this woman, and I realized, she, too, is human. We are all human, dealing with the complexities and death and birth and change that life sends our way. Difficulty, loss, struggle, these are all situations that cause us to naturally stress, tighten up, retreat within and become short with others.

The next day, when Sandy came in, she was different. Or perhaps the change was within me. I was different.

She opened with asking my coworker and I, “How are my two favorite coffee creators today?”

Strikingly different from any of our previous interactions, Sandy and I had a fun little banter and more sincere conversation, meanwhile, in the back of my mind I puzzled how I could have been her favorite all along when I had perceived her as negative and controlling. She is not mean after all, but a woman who has been through an incredible amount of loss. I am sorry to have judged her and have made my own assumptions.

The fantastic thing is that I will see her tomorrow, and the next day and the week and month after that, and every new day is a new chance to connect. As Rumi said, “ Out beyond ideas of right doing and wrong doing (judgment) there is a field. I will meet you there.”

These opportunities to change my perception are everywhere. When someone cuts in front of me in traffic, I won’t assume they are a terrible driver but in an emergency rush to get to the E.R. Or when the man on the plane next to me crosses his arms and looks down his nose at me in silence when I ask him how he is doing, I might acknowledge that it must be tough being paralyzed by fear of flying. And I will have patience with that quiet early morning couple. Knowing that one day, maybe months from now, hundreds of mochas from now, they might tell me all about their weekend and ask how mine was in return, at last ready and in the right space to open up and bloom.

The closed fist cannot shake hands, cannot receive. The closed mind cannot perceive another‘s humanness. The closed heart cannot receive love.

A Very Different Party

Every September, a migration of Whale Sharks moves off the Caribbean coast of Mexico. Actually a fish, with the shape of a shark and the feeding habits of a whale, they are the only members of their genus and their family. At 40 feet long, weighing 60,000 pounds, Whale Sharks are the largest fish in the sea. I am certain that swimming with these school bus-sized fish is one of the most incredible things a person can do. That’s why I return year after year to play with them.

Our boat trip to swim with Whale Sharks was a two hour search out to sea. The deep dark teal water was anything but calm. Flying fish scattered out away from the boat’s wake. Spooked up in flocks, they transformed from fish to birds as they left the sea for the air, sailing like skipping stones inches from the surface before diving back into the waves.

On whatever level you look at it, we either create the experience we want, or we draw to us the experience with our intention or expectations, or experiences simply go how you think they will go. But have you ever noticed that many things we do in our lives, we do not do alone?

Conscious of it or not, we all come to a situation with a desired outcome. Not everyone has similar expectations and intentions about how the event will go. This explains how several people can show up at the exact same party and have a very different experience. Those who attend the party for the drugs, will find them. Those who go to the party to get very drunk, will do so. And those who go to connect with friends, may miss the drugs all together. If I attend the party with a friend who feels it will be boring, they’ll be looking for reasons that this is a waste of time. The trick is for me to not adopt my friend’s attitude so that I can still have fun while they are yawning, inspecting their fingernails in a corner.

We are all choosing the nature of our experience. I feel this variation is fantastic, but I wish not to allow the experience other people are having dictate my experience. I can acknowledge that they are having their own experience, and allow mine to be exactly what I want it to be.

On the bumpy boat ride out to sea, I refocused my intention of finding the Whale Sharks, swimming with many of them and having an incredible time.

I laughed out loud as the boat leapt over waves, crashing and booming against the face of the sea. It was such a violent ride that I had to stand up and hold on to the boat’s metal frame to keep my back from popping out of alignment. I chose to see the fun in the jarring outing. Like riding a speeding mechanical bull, the advanced challenge is to smile while you are there. I smile because Life is often a mirror of our attitude.

Other people on the boat became sea sick, and I moved to give them plenty of room to have their experience, watching the horizon for sign of the whale fish we were searching for.

The couple next to us, clutching the collars of their lifejackets, asked, “Have you done this before?”

I smiled and nodded.

“Have the Whale Sharks ever eaten people on tours like this?”

“No,” I said, laughing. “They eat plankton like other whales. They have baleen instead of teeth. Last year I remember thinking that I would fit in that mouth, but certainly not on purpose.”

The wife smiled back at me nervously. “Did you see any other kinds of sharks out here last year?”

I explained how many times I have scuba dove in these waters, and have met very few predators. I deflected her fear with stories of the nurse sharks, who remind me of giant salamanders with their round noses, who will lie still and act hypnotized when you roll them over and rub their belly, like frogs.

I wondered for a brief moment how to let this woman have her own experience. I obviously was going to be thrilled to swim next to 40 foot long Whale Sharks.

But if she decided to be eaten by another kind of shark, I’d have to not participate. She’d be on her own there. By not agreeing with her, by not swapping Great White stories oozing with drama, I was continuing to hold my own intention and clarified that her experience may be different from mine.

Later, after swimming with 14 spotted fish the size of a bus, she traded her fear for awe and came up with a huge grin under her snorkel and mask shouting, “This is SO COOL!”

And really, I had to agree with her there. The Whale Sharks were just as gentle and speckled as I remembered them. All other thoughts immediately stopped when I was swimming next to these huge beasts. It is a wonder my heart did not stop too, and that I remembered to breathe, for I was not aware of myself at all, only of how incredible the whales were. All I could do is stare and study them as they opened their square noses to gulp in grey clouds of plankton. In vain, I tried to kick harder to keep up with their tall pointed tail. And I giggled when they turned around and swam back towards me, doing switch backs in the water.

I asked the boat captain if we could stop and swim with them again. In exasperated Spanish he told me, “But you already have 8 times! We have lunch ready. Do you never eat?”

So now that I understand that everyone has a different experience at the same party of life, I can start to apply that knowledge.

For example, on my next dive, I really wanted to see an octopus, because they fascinate me. When I told my dive master this, he told me, “Don’t get your hopes up. I have never seen octopi in the daytime. Only on night dives.”

I understand that he has dove right here, nearly every day of his adult life, that he knows these dive sites like watery rooms in his own home. And when he says he knows what is or is not in them, he’s probably right. He won’t see any octopi in the day time.

Sure enough, after we descended, he was swimming ahead of me and missed the orange Day Octopus hiding in the shipwreck. However, I was able to take a photo for him. Its always neat when someone can show you something new about the world you know so well.

Now, when I am heading into new situations, new locations, or new parties, so to speak, I acknowledge that I can have the exact experience I want to have. I can refrain from picking up the expectations of others, or their fears. I don’t have to agree and adopt how they say it will be, and I can differentiate that is how it will be for them and allow them their own experience. For mine, is a completely different kind of party.

Reality Check!

Recently, my boyfriend Tim and I crossed paths with a woman whom we used to work with four years ago at a company called DiLusso. She and her husband are still with the same company, one which I had left because it was an unhealthy amount of stress. I can only imagine what it would have done to me if I had stayed four more years. I would honestly have grey hair before thirty. The worry lines on my face would be deep. The time and opportunity to grow as a person internally, would have been blocked. DiLusso is one of those all consuming companies that sucks you in and demands all of your energy, your thoughts, your free time.

The woman asked if we had heard about her husband’s heart attack, how she had been so close to loosing him the week before. She retold the story, of how he had turned white and left work, had called her around noon needing a ride to the hospital.

As they waited in the E.R. for his operation for an angioplasty and a stint, he joked with her. While holding his aching chest, he whispered, “so this is what it takes for me to have time to take my wife out to lunch?”

The operation went well, and now his teenage son follows him everywhere. He is his father’s shadow, and in turn, his own shadow is darkened by the knowledge of how limited their time together may be.

We asked if her husband was making changes. In diet, yes. But at work? Is he still so committed, working 12 to 14 hours every day? Going in every weekend? Her hesitation let us know that the work schedule would not change. This man knows how to work hard, and to say he spends more time with the company than he does his family is a laughable understatement.

She was in a place of defending and justifying, and I let her stay there. She did say that her husband was too young to have a heart attack at 44.

“Not with his lifestyle,” I said. Not with that amount of daily, hourly stress, not at all. And with no change, I understand what his son now knows.

She then asked, “How are you guys? Are you okay?” The question held the tone of: is your lifeboat still in one piece? Will you guys make it another 10 hours? I had to be firm and honest. “We are more than okay! We are awesome!” I said.

“Yes, we are really good.” Tim told her, “We just got back from a week together in Mexico, and we have tickets now for our next trip to Costa Rica.”

I could see in her eyes how tough it was for her to hear how different our priorities had become from her own. And I am reminded that everyone is where they choose to be. We both, individually, made the choice to leave the company. Because we wanted more out of life than work. Because we recognized it was unhealthy. And because do not allow ourselves to stay in a situation like that. Four years later, we are both filled with gratitude that our situation is different because of our choices.

Running into this woman was a reminder. A reality check. Reflecting on the conversation, my boyfriend and I realized we could easily still be in the same place as this couple. This woman’s husband filled Tim’s position when he left. It is that close to home. Their reality is that they have not been to lunch together, have not shared an hour alone on a date in a very long time. Our reality, thankfully, is seven days together on an island.

I have thought a lot about, and written before about being consciously aware if the situations and relationships I am in are healthy or unhealthy. And about being willing to change my situation, to leave behind any role that does not support my true essence, that drains me. I left DiLusso, it was because of that. Quitting that job was the first time I had actually drawn the line and decided I deserved better. I had no other job to jump to. I had no other form of income. I had a heavy guilt trip of abandoning the huge responsibility that had been placed upon me at work. Still, I left, I leapt forward, into the vast ravine of the unknown. The only thing I knew for certain, and kept trusting, was that the unseen place which awaited me would be better.

I feel this interaction with the woman last night was life yet again coming full circle. It is the me I would have been if I had stayed, meeting the me who left. She is my ‘what if’ I stayed. I am her ‘what if’ she left. Perhaps it is just me showing myself, reminding myself that I made the right choice. Her reality is everything I don’t want in my world. And I have moved beyond that by choice.

I understand now that the life I am living is poignantly the other side of that ravine. I created what I was jumping to and am living the ‘something better’ out every day.

Will Give For Love

Years ago, I was a caregiver to a fault. I had a knack for giving the perfect gifts. I was constantly anticipating the needs of others, to help them before they even had to ask for my assistance. I even changed the way I spoke around people as to edit out the parts of a story that might not interest them or might bother them. In this way, I was not being honest with myself - I was showing up in the world as I thought others wanted me to be, not as who I authentically was. I tried to be the perfect girlfriend by memorizing facts about the sport teams my guy was following of T.V. I pierced my top earlobe because the man I dated thought it was sexy. I bought myself an awkward heavy mountain bike because he liked to bike. Biking was sweaty, and frustrating and hurt, but I wasn’t honest about that with myself, I was pretending it was fun.

I had a wake up call one Christmas. I was dating the mountain biker at the time, and I had ordered him a very rare vintage specialty bike with fantastically cool details that mean nothing now. This beautiful sleek bicycle represented 98 percent of my paycheck for the month, but it was just what he wanted. I spent hours assembling the bike and creating the perfect timing to surprise him with my excessive gift.

That Christmas, my boyfriend was very pleased and surprised, and I was also surprised when he mentioned sheepishly that he had forgotten to get me a present.

While eating ramen noodles every meal for the entire month (because after the bike purchase, I had no funds for more than that) I had some time to reflect. I stared into my noodle bowl night after night and realized that something felt very wrong about the lack of reciprocation in the area of giving in my relationship. At first, I blamed my boyfriend. Many noodle bowls later, I did the hard thing and faced myself. I stepped back to see the big picture and realized he may be under-giving, but I was over giving. Why? Immediately, I claimed I gave because I loved him. But the truth was harder to admit: I, myself, wanted to be loved. I felt that the only way to be loved was to give to someone. If I met his needs, then I felt needed. If he needed me, he would not leave me. My own insecurities were fueling my obsession with giving to others.

Getting out of this mindset involved trusting the knowledge that I was enough. I was worthy of love as who I was, not for what I gave to someone. I also had to get to a point of trusting that I would be okay if we stayed together, and I would be okay if we separated.

I had to ask if I was being honest with myself. Was I living my life according to what others would accept, or was it really what I wanted to do?

If I wanted to be loved for who I truly was and not what I could do for someone, I needed to ask, is the real me showing up to be loved? I had to be able to accept and love that girl before I’d be comfortable presenting her to another person.

Another long term lesson was how to care about someone and take care of them without crossing a boundary of caring less for myself. To care for them without sacrificing or changing myself.

One of the most valuable pieces of advice I ever received from my life coach was a metaphor. Imagine that you wake up every morning with one full glass of water. This is your energy for the day. When you get dressed and brush your teeth, you are using a little of that water. When you pick up the phone to talk to a friend, you are using some of that water. When you do things for others, you are pouring energy into their cups. If you are worrying about something, that takes away some of your water. If you are someone who is constantly thinking of, taking care of and doing things for others, then by the middle of your day, your ability to do things is exhausted, your cup is empty and there is no energy left for yourself. As an often dehydrated person, after hearing this metaphor, I tried to be consciously aware of how much energy I spend on myself and others and find a way to maintain a balance.

We teach others how to treat us. If we consistently take on all the household chores, we are teaching them to rely on us to always do these. If we do not value our needs and put ourselves first, they will think we have no needs. If we are not aware of our own needs, how can they possibly be met by another?

In a way, being honest with myself extended to many unexpected areas of my life. For one thing, I ate better because I didn’t spend my entire paycheck unnecessarily making someone else happy. I had a new beloved friend and I knew her true likes, dislikes and her needs. And I traded that heavy, much-loathed mountain bike for a lifetime supply of double fudge brownies because honestly, I love them.

　

Landscapes Within Us

My heart accelerates with the plane. This is the part of flying I love the most. Speeding up until we leave the ground, until we part with the earth, until we pull away from gravity, that one force that has control over us at all times. Interesting to be affected by something every minute of our existence, under its control until we don’t even consider it anymore. When the plane takes off, we hover above and upwards, until anything is possible. I feel free, like I could go anywhere. As long as I have enough fuel, that is. Oh, yes, I want to fly. I want to have my own little plane. Where would I go? More than cities, more than countries, it is the internal landscapes that I want to visit most. Why am I here, for example? It is not this river that I am rising above, it is not the water reflecting the silver sky as it snakes towards the foothills of mountains feeding it with snow. It is not this city, laid out like light blocks, perfectly symmetrical, in straight lines from any angle. It is simply the unexpected rush of emotion when a year old baby boy pulls himself up on my knees so he is tall enough to hug me. It’s the conversation with his mother, feet to feet on the couch, as we peel back the layers through words, and share until we get to that place where we feel understood, and from an internal perspective, I can say: I see you. Yes, I’d fly hours and states away for that connection.

My journeys, I have realized, have nothing to do with the 17 physical countries I have been to. The destinations are external. But what I am really chasing is a feeling, an internal landscape. I am looking for what shows up on the mirror of my soul when I stand, swim or hike through an area. It’s not Cozumel, it is the feeling of being a special guest in the most colorful glowing sea garden imaginable! It’s not Peru, it’s the dizzy feeling, the goosebumps that come when I am standing in a 1200 year old temple dwarfed in the shadow of a condor, on a mountain, surrounded by mountains. It’s not India itself, it is the expanding feeling as my mind opens with the books in the Tibetan Library. Just as the Ganges is not a river there, but at sunrise its the glowing body of a god. And to paddle out on the Ganges is to reunite with, be surrounded by and in the flow of the sacred. It’s not a vacation I am seeking in Hawaii, it is that unique sun-kissed sensation when I am happily exhausted just out of the ocean. The way I can feel the tingle of freckles popping up on my salt-smoothed skin.

Looking at things on an internal landscape, I feel why I am working where people are doing what they love to do. I can feel why I am with a man who holds so much passion and creativity in his heart that is escapes every few seconds and races down his arms, through his fingers and into the touch that tells I am loved. Its more than his face or his shape, some well designed castle, it is who lives there that intrigues me.

Why do we do the activities that we do? I kayak because I love the places that river can take me, I love being openly in the perspective where it may reveal to me its beauty. I dive because I love being reminded that there is a whole other realm, a whole other world and ecosystem under the surface, and to be a part of that, to float weightless, and the feeling it gives me of discovering things I never before knew existed.

I do not travel to go places, if I could ever put that into words to express to you, I travel to be places, to feel places, to again fuel that fire in my heart.

What if we all looked at why we do what we do from the internal landscape? Why do you live where you live? Why do you date who you date? What feeling are you chasing by the work you do? I find more importance in how all these things make me feel, and I suppose that is because I put so much priority in feeling good, in living happily.

What is the feeling you are chasing? Is it a feeling of belonging, of being needed, of being successful? What would it be like if we looked at the internal before we chose the external? If I am looking for a feeling of connection, where would I work, where would I travel, who would I befriend to find that feeling? How could we alter our behavior or our location to align with the internal feeling we are chasing? Would we have a better chance of getting what we want if we first identified with what it felt like and then moved towards what it looks like?

And so I board another plane, returning to the corresponding little notches that fit along the sides of my puzzle piece. Plugging back into the equation I have drawn of my life. Fully conscious that I could at anytime change the piece. And there are a thousand equations I could plug into to make my life work, so many little variables added together may equal the feeling I am chasing. On a physical airplane, flying towards a feeling. From one internal landscape to another, fulfilled and connected.