Evolutions .....

While we were in Chile, we filled you in on all the fun and adventures that we were having, but there was a lot going on behind the scenes. As always, we had a great trip, but there was something missing. Many things started seeming like we had “been there and done that”. The universe is a great teacher, and we were presented with many opportunities for reflection and growth – from the cancelling of our volunteer work with the chinchillas, to smaller, more mundane experiences, like hearing tourists talk about what countries they had “done”. We knew it was time for some changes….

We had never intended for our efforts (or indeed this blog) to be about our ‘vacations’. Indeed, in one of our founding books, Your Money or Your Life, the authors express interest and concern about why one would need to ‘vacate’ a life anyway …… There is a lot to be gained from travelling, but for us, it was time to grow some more and move forward again towards bigger dreams.

So, what does this mean? Good question, and that is what we spent much time figuring out in Chile. With this in mind, we reviewed all of our work that had got us this far, and started integrating and developing the next step from our foundations we put in place this year.

Some things we know for sure:
1. We have been fairly successful in ‘exiting stage left’ from the routine days, weeks, months that had seemed to want to drain our life from us.
2. We want as much of our time to be spent making a positive difference in the world – whether that is directly helping others or simply because we are so happy we can always spare the extra smile or kind word that can make a difference.
3. We are convinced there are many ways to live, and that there is no one right way for us or anyone else, and that we always have choices to make that can move us forward, sideline us, or move us backwards
4. We want an alternative to the usual frenetic pace most people in our culture seem to live their life. It is often much more of a culture shock for us coming back into the US than it is leaving. Arriving back in Bellingham from Chile, we stopped to pick up groceries at our local supermarket, and couldn’t believe how stressed, unhappy and at times, mean, people seemed to be shopping for groceries. And also we don’t want to forget that this is shocking to us once we are integrated back into this culture.
5. We still love and want to travel, but maybe with different or clearer objectives – to either travel solely for fun to those special places we have always dreamed of going to, or to travel with a specific volunteer project in mind.

So, in Chile we agreed on some pretty significant changes that we would make to our lives when we returned to allow us more space, more time, and more freedom to become:
Phase One
We initially focused on settling in at home, and observing our lives, with time at home, simplifying and contemplating, to make space to fully understand what we wanted next. With this achieved by such things as cutting back on work (and spending!), cutting back on other commitments, and shifting our priorities around, we have now moved onto the next phase.
Phase Two
Now we are working on developing our long term planning, furthering old dreams and creating new ones, setting projects, and reaching out to others, including making more of a difference in our local community.

Hot on the heels of all this change, we went to Seattle last weekend to a “You Can Change Your Life” conference, which was something we had enrolled in before we had gone to Chile. Led by Louise Hay, a hero for both of us, we listened to major players in the field of life coaching, spiritual development and healing. What a great opportunity to support our changes. And as luck (grace) would have it, quite by chance(?) we happened to be one of the lucky few of the thousands there who stumbled across Louise Hay hanging out quietly in the foyer ….. yes, we got to meet her , have her sign our dog-eared copy of her book, receive a little gift from her and give her a hug! Talk about inspirational!! For those of you that don’t know about Louise Hay, she is a metaphysical lecturer, teacher and best selling author, and is a pioneer in the realm of mind-body health. You can learn more about her at www.louisehay.com

So, one of our commitment is to develop how we are using our blog. We plan to do weekly postings about our life, the changes and dreams we are creating, and how we are doing this. For those of you wanting more information, we recommend that you start with the books that have been one of our major sources of inspiration. These are listed in our profile.
Stay tuned – we have lots going on and lots to tell!
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“Every moment of life is a new beginning point as we move from the old. This moment is a new point of beginning for me right here and right now. All is well in my world.” (Louise Hay)