A gentle breeze is blowing in the window of the room where I am sitting. The birds are serenading me while I look outside through these windows and see the colors of the tropical flowers that are surrounding me. Right now I am complete and feel satiated.

How often do I feel complete and satiated? This question is rising inside of me as I sit in this space. The last few years have expanded my awareness as I have connected to a deeper sense of what complete and satiated means for me. Sitting and reflecting for hours at a time or being absorbed in a good book and losing myself inside those pages and characters, walking and wandering on a boardwalk or in a park. Sitting at home at my kitchen table gazing outside at my beautiful Black Locust trees.   The flowers of the black locust trees are extremely fragrant and only last for about a week. They bloom mid-May to early June depending on the winter/spring weather. I try not to plan any trips during that time period because I never want to miss seeing the flowers bloom and smelling the intense fragrance of these beautiful and delicate flowers. Being surrounded by the smells and vibrancy of these tropical blooms is reminding me of how much I love my black locusts trees.

The simplicity of life in the fragrance of a flower!

This is what traveling does for me. 

Traveling helps me remember what life is all about. It helps me to unravel and re-connect with those parts of myself that may be pushed aside or deemed not that important in my daily life experience. Traveling has always been magic for me. It accelerates all my senses and helps me to stay connected to myself. I’m always being stimulated to learn something new and different about myself when I am in an unfamiliar environment. I love to observe local people and see what they do and how they move through their day and in their life. I feel excited and nourished by watching everything and being open to what is presented in the moment. Watching local men fish from the shoreline of a beach I was walking on. Seeing the interactions between mothers and children, men and women, workers on the street and in the shops. I breathe in the fragrance of their lives and feel the differences and maybe some comparison to how I live. I can say that theirs seems to be a simpler life. So in that statement I am making a comparison and then I return to my reflections of myself sitting at my kitchen table looking at my black locust trees in my yard. Isn’t that a simple life? I am imagining maybe by someone else’s standards that would be deemed a simple life.

I like to say everything is relative. Who is to say what is simple or what is active or what is a lot? It is such an individual thing to decide what makes each of us happy in every moment.

Live your life in the way you choose

Live and follow your dreams because they are yours and important.

Learn to deeply love–Yourself first because this is where it all begins.