There is something about this place that sets my soul on fire. I'm not talking about the kind of fire that spreads manically, searing all in its path, rather I'm talking about of the smoldering kind. Slowly burning through every part of me, inch by inch erasing the past and the future. All that's left is the present moment and Man, I can tell you that the present is a beautiful place to be.
The moment I arrived here, I felt a glimmer of hope that my state of being would be changing and changing dramatically. I think change may be the wrong word, perhaps it's more of a re-awakening to a greatness that lives in me and in fact, lives in you.
I don't know why I picked this particular place, far from any sort of, shall I say, civilization. I visited once a month ago, told my best friend I was moving here on the long ride home, and, well here I am. I have never been one not to follow what my heart is telling me to do and my heart was practically yelling at me, "This! This is the place! Oh, please? Can we?" To which my head replied, "Well, I guess you've never led me astray, so yep, why not?!" It's all sort of a blur to me now. I feel like I have been moving at break neck speed, yet through quick sand the past month.
And now my feet are slowly moving out of the quick sand I was stuck in, my mind is processing all that is new and the sludge is lifting. I don't want to lose the wonder I feel right now at this place. I want to hold onto it, capturing each moment in technicolor. Yet, I know that I cannot. Perhaps, all that I have learned through my journeying is right here. That it's OK to settle in once place for an indeterminate amount of time and to not want more than what is right before me. Because you see, I have always wanted more. More adventure, more journeying, more living. I have always sought out the new eagerly replacing all that is present with a dream of what should be in the future. I want to stop doing that and right now, my want has become a reality.
I woke up this morning feeling particularly sad about something that I cannot even speak about any longer, it's just been too deadly to all that is good in my life. I wandered around my house and onto my patio just as the sun was rising. I startled two Bucks in full antler velvet in my yard. They stared at me for what seemed like minutes, gauging me, testing me. And in that moment, I felt a moment of pure grace. I realized that it was OK to be sad, to not fight it, to let it be, and to just KNOW that being sad was my present and my present is not my future or even the next moment.
I cannot say any longer how I will feel next week, or next month, or next year. But as the thunder rolls in over the mountains, bouncing around my space with booms and streaks of lighting, I feel a sense of the present. A sense that if I can only take each moment as it comes and learn to love each moment alike. The smoldering fire that has replaced anger, stress, enmity, and hate wants to love all that is around me, consume all with the kind of love that doesn't burn, but rather encompasses and comforts.
Peace, love, and joy
Lara
Tuesday, July 19, 2011
Sunday, July 17, 2011
A Fresh Start to Something Good
I have to start this by saying that the past 6 months have been quite possibly the hardest of my life, there was so much general upheaval, and I believe that for the most part, I did not deal with the changes very well. I was pretty awful to a ton of people and am going to live with that for a long time.
Let me talk for a moment, about my having to end my round the world journey. I want you to get the full picture of my emotional and mental state. To say that it was a blow to be hurt so badly, is an understatement. I was lost. All of my dreams for the future were destroyed on one nasty wave on a tiny island in Indonesia. In fact, that wave took away 20 years of dreaming, hoping, and planning. It devastated me to come back here in so many different ways. I was angry. Angry at myself for taking a wave far too big for my skill set, angry to get on that plane and come back, angry that everything had been taken from me. I felt that I had given my life away and I was never going to be able to get it back. Fast forward to right now, at this moment and my leg is twinging a bit, swollen a bit still and just generally in poor shape. Time is a bitch when you want it to speed up. She laughs at you and says "Hell no, you have to be patient, I will heal you when I'm good and ready".
In the midst of readjusting to coming back here and deciding that I would go back to Vegas (mostly because I didn't have anywhere else to go) my business partners and I launched a new company and web-site. I was trying to juggle that work, plus a few PR clients and just generally didn't care very much about the latter. It was like I had stepped back into my old life, but my old life was looking incredibly shitty. The past few months have been jam packed with an unreal amount of work, but I do love what has come out of it, I ADORE the project and have put my heart and soul into it. I briefly dabbled with traveling again, I set my sights on exploring the far corners of Africa, falling asleep at night dreaming of Nile boats and mud huts on river banks. And then I stopped. The fact is, I don't want to leave just now. I want to stay and watch the company grow. I came back here, sure that I was going to leave again and soon and in the end I realized that's not what I want.
Now, let's get to the heart of it. I'm going to just delve right in and let you guys know that I have had so much anger inside the past 6 months and I'm just now wrapping my head around it. I've never been a particularly angry person, I'm pretty even keel on that scale, but you wouldn't know it if you had just met me. It's pretty hard to wrap my head around it all and I have had to dig deep to figure out why. I become this judgmental, awful person that I have never been. I feel like I came back to the states a far worse person than I was when I left in so many ways. It was all just too much. I realize now that by constantly running and moving, I didn't have a safe place to land when I needed it. Sure, I have friends some who have been with me since I was single digits old, but still with virtually no family and new relationships just developing in my life, it's been tough. Couple that with living in a house in Vegas that was the worst possible place for me to be, having to cut people out of my life for adding to my stress,and just generally walking around being a raging bitch and I am surprised that so many have stuck around and more surprised I didn't have a complete meltdown. And I regret being this person that has a hard time accepting any help from anyone. I have realized that sometimes it's OK to be weak and man, have I been weak. Weak, and mad, and sad, and just sort of awful inside. I have cried myself to sleep more times than I thought possible lately and the hardest part is that I still don't fully know why. Yet, the tears have flowed freely.
I left Vegas yesterday. For good this time. I have settled in a tiny town in the mountains, hoping to get my soul back and find that light that used to shine so brightly in me. I want to rekindle my love affair with myself and I knew that I wasn't going to be able to do that in Vegas, a truly soul-less heartless place. Right now, I am sitting in my living room, the sound of Aspens in the wind is filling up my space and the mountains are beckoning for me to come explore.
I am going to devote my time and energy into helping our company grow, into getting my leg fully healed, and into reconnecting with people that I have lost along the way. And I promise I am going to write more. To write is to live for me and I haven't been truly living this year. But I will. Tonight, I am going to raise my glass to fresh starts and those that have been with me on all of mine. Here's to life and living and loving (again)!
Lara
Let me talk for a moment, about my having to end my round the world journey. I want you to get the full picture of my emotional and mental state. To say that it was a blow to be hurt so badly, is an understatement. I was lost. All of my dreams for the future were destroyed on one nasty wave on a tiny island in Indonesia. In fact, that wave took away 20 years of dreaming, hoping, and planning. It devastated me to come back here in so many different ways. I was angry. Angry at myself for taking a wave far too big for my skill set, angry to get on that plane and come back, angry that everything had been taken from me. I felt that I had given my life away and I was never going to be able to get it back. Fast forward to right now, at this moment and my leg is twinging a bit, swollen a bit still and just generally in poor shape. Time is a bitch when you want it to speed up. She laughs at you and says "Hell no, you have to be patient, I will heal you when I'm good and ready".
In the midst of readjusting to coming back here and deciding that I would go back to Vegas (mostly because I didn't have anywhere else to go) my business partners and I launched a new company and web-site. I was trying to juggle that work, plus a few PR clients and just generally didn't care very much about the latter. It was like I had stepped back into my old life, but my old life was looking incredibly shitty. The past few months have been jam packed with an unreal amount of work, but I do love what has come out of it, I ADORE the project and have put my heart and soul into it. I briefly dabbled with traveling again, I set my sights on exploring the far corners of Africa, falling asleep at night dreaming of Nile boats and mud huts on river banks. And then I stopped. The fact is, I don't want to leave just now. I want to stay and watch the company grow. I came back here, sure that I was going to leave again and soon and in the end I realized that's not what I want.
Now, let's get to the heart of it. I'm going to just delve right in and let you guys know that I have had so much anger inside the past 6 months and I'm just now wrapping my head around it. I've never been a particularly angry person, I'm pretty even keel on that scale, but you wouldn't know it if you had just met me. It's pretty hard to wrap my head around it all and I have had to dig deep to figure out why. I become this judgmental, awful person that I have never been. I feel like I came back to the states a far worse person than I was when I left in so many ways. It was all just too much. I realize now that by constantly running and moving, I didn't have a safe place to land when I needed it. Sure, I have friends some who have been with me since I was single digits old, but still with virtually no family and new relationships just developing in my life, it's been tough. Couple that with living in a house in Vegas that was the worst possible place for me to be, having to cut people out of my life for adding to my stress,and just generally walking around being a raging bitch and I am surprised that so many have stuck around and more surprised I didn't have a complete meltdown. And I regret being this person that has a hard time accepting any help from anyone. I have realized that sometimes it's OK to be weak and man, have I been weak. Weak, and mad, and sad, and just sort of awful inside. I have cried myself to sleep more times than I thought possible lately and the hardest part is that I still don't fully know why. Yet, the tears have flowed freely.
I left Vegas yesterday. For good this time. I have settled in a tiny town in the mountains, hoping to get my soul back and find that light that used to shine so brightly in me. I want to rekindle my love affair with myself and I knew that I wasn't going to be able to do that in Vegas, a truly soul-less heartless place. Right now, I am sitting in my living room, the sound of Aspens in the wind is filling up my space and the mountains are beckoning for me to come explore.
I am going to devote my time and energy into helping our company grow, into getting my leg fully healed, and into reconnecting with people that I have lost along the way. And I promise I am going to write more. To write is to live for me and I haven't been truly living this year. But I will. Tonight, I am going to raise my glass to fresh starts and those that have been with me on all of mine. Here's to life and living and loving (again)!
Lara
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