Skip to main content

Simplicity: What travel is teaching me.

Simplicity:
The quality of being simple; freedom from complexity; absence of pretentiousness


What travel is teaching me...


Life becomes complicated far to easily. 
How quickly we can become slaves to things we never intended to be enslaved to. 

We can be taken in so easily by an 'ideal life', career, relationship, consumed by the desire for possessions & titles.
Only to find ourselves in the midst of something we never fully intended to be in.
Suddenly asking the question, 'How did I get here?'
Lost in the cycle.

Meeting people, hearing their stories and listening to the wisdom from those who have chosen to learn & grow from the things that happened in their life.

These people, their stories, their friendship has truly been one of the greatest gifts in my life.

I am inspired, encouraged, challenged and overwhelmed.
Life is a teacher if we are willing to be a student, admitting 'I don't know it all.'


With open heart and mind, the wisdom and perspective shared can help shift and shake one out of a 'rut', for lack of a better word.

To look outside of the bubble we call life.
To look outside of ourselves.
To see people.
To see need.
To understand life is lived in the tension.
Life is lived in seasons.
Nothing is forever.

Switchfoot says it best in a song called The World You Want.

The world feels so malicious
With all our hits and misses
Feels like we're in the business of rust
It's when I stop to listen
All the moments I've been missing

I finally hear a voice I can trust
Is this the world you want?
Is this the world you want?
Your making it
Everyday you're alive.


You start to look like what you believe
You float through time like a stream
If the waters of time are made up by you and I
If you change the world for you, you change it for me...











Comments

Popular posts from this blog

Changing Leaves

"I keep turning over new leaves, and spoiling them, as I used to spoil my copybooks; and I make so many beginnings there never will be an end."   ~Jo March,  Louisa May Alcott, Little Women. A few years ago, I upgraded to a new-to-me, used iPhone.  The camera was better, the storage slightly larger for my obsessive hobby of taking photos of things that caught my eye during walks.  (Let me be honest, it happened far too often, but then again, it's who I am!) My friend's husband jokingly asked if it came with a photo album of leaves, or something along those lines. To his credit, it was a witty and hilarious joke that reflected a reality and truth, that all who were present knew very well... Sheena sure loved to post photos of leaves. I can't help it, my breath catches and I want to document the moment, the transition and to share it with others.  The difference between today and tomorrow is everything in this season.  So, I don't want to miss this moment, th...

Waiting for Gilbert

The unfolding of something beautiful is sometimes found in the waiting I went for a walk with a friend a while back along the river. Our goal was to find a independently owned coffee shop/tea house at the next town. As we got closer, we discovered that what we were looking for didn't seem to be found anywhere. We contemplated just going into a pub, but thought, 'no there must be something more.' We carried on walking. Hoping. But seeing nothing. We saw the familiar signs. Starbucks, Costa, Nero. Looking at each other... looking to the other, to decide what to do.... 'Do we just cave in, is there any hope of finding what we were looking for.,,?' We decided to give it a few more minutes,walking a bit further. Something caught our eye. No big sign, nothing to suggest this is it, this is what we had been looking for. Just little things to peak our curiosity, little bits of hope arising. As we got to this door we looked in to discover, a unique coffee sho...

Hello my old friend

Photo by  Hush Naidoo  on  Unsplash    Friday evening coffee with a friend = a decision to drop by the  Blood Donation Clinic first. They called to say they were in town. Having missed the call, I forgot the message. Until the evening rolled around. I messaged my friend. "Should we do our civic duty  and go give blood before coffee?" "My mother is telling me not to be a wuss... so I guess I have to..." After arriving, we have to answer quite a few interesting  questions to confirm eligibility. Next step, they test your hemoglobin levels. To be eligible to donate, your blood must read 125 & over. 'Prick' My finger now flowing just enough for them to take and test. 124. An option to test the other hand. But they must collect enough for two readings. Both readings must be 125+ 127 120 Not able to donate. Leaving the cubicle, hands empty, my friend's eyes take note, register the fact I am withou...