Sometimes, things don’t go according to plan and yet turn out to be just right. I’ve been on the most random of all trips for about a month now. I didn’t know where I would go or how long I’d be when I first started traveling. And I still don’t know. But I don’t feel like I need to, either. 🤷♀️
Time will tell.
It always does.
Wandering through Life
I go where I feel drawn to.
I stay where I feel comfortable.
I leave when I feel ready.
It really is that simple.
Allowing this trip to be whatever it’s gonna be is the most beautiful invitation to integrate some of the themes I’ve been exploring and practicing over the past years: Presence. Acceptance. Non-attachment. Flow. Trust. Faith. Ease.
2021 Intentions coming into play
What I find extremely interesting is that this current call to integrate and implement is 100% in line with the intention I set in the beginning of the year. I chose integration as my key theme for 2021, because I had observed myself getting lost in concepts and routines, mistaking the practices for the „real thing“.
In January 2021, I asked myself…
- What good does it do to sit in meditation every day if it doesn’t impact the way I show up in the world?
- What do I read all these books, listen to all these podcasts and do all these courses for if I keep living in the ever-same cycles & patterns?
- What’s the point all these practices if I don’t bring what I learn into everyday life?
Practice is great, but…
Anyone can practice in silence and pretend to be oh-so zen when shutting out the world.
Anyone can escape to a cabin in the mountains and pretend they’re at peace.
Anyone can go to a retreat, remove all their triggers and mistake it for healing.
But that’s not enlightenment, that’s escapism.
That’s not waking up, but running away.
Don’t get me wrong.
All of these things have their time & place.
All of these things are useful.
All of these things have been essential parts of my personal journey.
BUT, they are just practice.
And yet, it’s so easy to confuse them with the „real deal“.
But it can’t stop there. It can’t end with practice.
Beautiful as the training may be, what’s the point of it if we never move on to play the actual game?
The aim of meditation is not being able to sit in silence for hours. The aim is to acquire certain skills and states we can draw upon when life gets tricky.
…what about LIFE?
- What about your family that annoys the sh*t out of you?
- What about when your relationship brings up your deepest wounds?
- What about when you’re treated unfairly, hurt, embarrassed, ignored?
- What about when you sit at work and simply don’t want to be there or get impatient while standing in line at the supermarket?
- What about the traffic jam, the missed train, the slow driver in front of you?
- What about that one friend who just won’t shut up about the ever-same problem?
- What about the weird uncle with his questionable views and sexist comments?
- What about the person on the other side of the political spectrum or the vaccine debate?
- What about the lover who ghosted you and never told you why?
- What about the tricky conversation you know you need to have but are terrified of?
- What about the boss who „just doesn’t get it“ or the co-worker who doesn’t do their part?
What about LIFE
in all its messiness and chaos,
its ups and downs,
its unfiltered reality?
THAT’s what we practice for.
That’s where we get to implement and grow what we’ve learned in solitude and isolation.
That’s where real meditation takes place.
You want it? You got it.
Thinking about all of this in the beginning of this year made me realize it was time for me to focus on implementing and actually living what I believe to be true.
Diving deeper into my work with Holistic Health & Life Coaching, I realized it was also time for me on a personal level to take the „Integrative“ in Integrative Nutrition a little more serious.
I asked for integration.
Now, 6 months later, I’m getting the opportunity for some serious integration.
Life is asking me to level the f*ck up,
to walk my talk,
to take my own medicine.
So here I am, doing my best to take what I’ve learned and apply it.
I’m reconnecting to my intuition on a whole new level. I’m learning to trust myself, my inner nudges and guidance like never before. And the situations, people and experiences this has brought up is simply incredible.
I guess that’s the beauty of integration: Challenging as it may be, ultimately, it’s what makes us more complete. It aligns our actions with our beliefs, our inner and outer worlds, our desired with our actual paths. It brings back the parts of ourselves we have lost, forgotten or left behind and allows us to shed whatever we’ve outgrown. It takes us closer to who we truly are. It gives purpose to our practice and makes it all worthwhile and real.
Doing is the highest form of knowing, after all. Is there anything you know and feel it’s time you start doing?