It’s never too late

Well, at least not as long as you are still above ground… and even then, who knows, really?

I’ve been pondering the chain of events that have been unfolding in the past months since I took up my blogging journey in earnest, and realizing how many marvelous new opportunities have been presenting themselves to me along the way.

These new opportunities for business and personal expansion are seemingly unrelated to my blog, but as we know, life works in mysterious and imperceptible ways, and one thing always leads to another….

My point?

When you say Yes to one opportunity, one commitment, one change in your life, it unleashes a whole chain reaction of previously unimaginable openings. It’s like you put your foot in the door, and before you know it the momentum of life and your own openness and willingness to respond opens it all the way.

And then?  Why then, anything is possible.

So remember dear reader, as long as you are still breathing, it's never too late to say Yes to something new!

Coming in for a landing: the bumps along the way

It’s often a bit bumpy when you fly in for a landing and go through that layer of clouds. It seems like a good analogy for the experience of re-entry into the atmosphere of your daily life after being away on a trip. It’s bound to be somewhat jarring.

There’s something wonderful about being away in a completely different environment for a time, especially when you are mostly cut off from the usual deluge of electronic bits of information, with its ensuing demands, on your time and energy. Quite liberating!

So I guess it’s no surprise to feel somewhat overwhelmed by the mountain of information, requests and demands that seem to have accumulated in your absence.

What to do?

The natural response is to tighten up, stop breathing, dive in head first, and try to tackle it all at once. Whoa!  Not a good idea. At least, not in my experience.

Having learned from past uncomfortable landings, I gave myself a whole day to do nothing but putter around and nest this time– take a nap, unpack, visit, and just land. That really helped!

And as to the mountain of to do’s? I remind myself that just because they exist, doesn’t mean I actually have to get them all done at once. I can actually choose, prioritize, delegate, postpone or even scratch them off my list entirely. After all, I am in control of my life, right?

Next time you face a bumpy landing, dear reader, take it from me, give yourself a break and remember – you get to choose what you do with your time and energy. It’s your precious life.

Stepping out and stepping in – who leaves and who comes back?

It’s truly amazing to me that thanks to modern air travel, in the space of 24 hours I went from a tiny village in the highlands of Chiapas back to my home in Santa Rosa, California – two such different realities.

But the really interesting thing is that, just slightly more than 24 hours after my return, I realize I am not the same person who stepped out from my front door two weeks ago.

It’s peculiar- how many times a day, a week, a month, do we step though our front doors, go out into the world, do our thing, and then step back in…. without even thinking about it, and probably assuming that the person who stepped out in the morning is the same person who steps back in some time later?

So what is it about life’s experiences when we are out in the world that changes us in some profound way? I’ve often had the experience of going on vacation and coming back refreshed and renewed, full of new memories and experiences, a more relaxed and happy person. Or of witnessing some challenging or even tragic event, and coming back shaken and vulnerable.

This 2-week time period time in Chiapas feels different. Not a vacation, but an immersion into another reality, a time of such intense focus that the rest of my life seemed almost like a distant dream. I realized it’s rare these days, with so many responsibilities and distractions, to spend a period of 2 weeks with such single minded concentration.

I don’t know if I could tell you what it is that has changed in me, what layers of inner transformation are making themselves slowly known. But I do know that as I allow it to be revealed, and give myself the time to sit in silence and contemplation and resist the temptation to rush helter-skelter back into the daily realities of life back home, that the mystery and the grace of embracing a new opportunity and challenge will continue to reverberate in my being.

But perhaps it doesn’t really take a 2-week odyssey into foreign territory to precipitate a change in consciousness, maybe all it takes is a willingness to be open and vulnerable to the mysteries that always surround us, and to give ourselves the gift of a pause when we step back in the door to reflect and integrate the day’s gifts.

So dear reader, who will you be when you step back in the door tonight?

A lifetime in 2 weeks

Our interpreting team and surgeon 

On my last morning here in San Cristobal Las Casas, it’s hard to believe I have been in Chiapas for 2 weeks. It literally feels like a little lifetime, this 2 weeks serving as a volunteer interpreter for Mammoth Medical Missions’ 2015 Chiapas trip.

It’s so interesting how you can live your life, do your regular thing, and time goes by in some semblance of predictability. Stuff happens, yet there’s a flow and a rhythm that is familiar, comfortable, known.

And then there are those peak life experiences, where you make a choice to put yourself smack dab in the middle of a completely new, unfamiliar and unpredictable situation. 

Each day is filled with so many new experiences, emotions, people, events and situations that you are always slightly off kilter, drawing on a deeper well of resilience, resources and energy to meet the day’s and the moment’s unique challenges. You discover you can handle way more than you thought you could, adapt more easily to changes and varying circumstances than you thought possible. You find yourself growing in new ways, stretching your sense of self and what is possible, discovering fresh perspectives.

Having spent these past 2 weeks in constant and intimate proximity to our team, the hospital staff and the people we have been here to serve, I am looking forward to the long plane trip home alone and the chance to process and let it all settle. This has definitely been one of the richest and most rewarding and moving experiences of my life, and after 60+ years on the planet, that is saying a lot!

One of the images that is engraved in my heart, is the beautiful young indigenous woman who woke up from anesthesia in the operating room, crying from relief and gratitude that the inguinal hernia that she had suffered from for years, that had caused her so much pain that she had only been able to eat 2 tortillas a day for the past 2 months, was now gone through the miracle of surgery.

The world’s problems are so vast, and we often feel so hopeless and helpless in the face of the enormity of suffering that surrounds us, it is a huge blessing to be able to have played a small part in relieving the suffering of even one person.

Hasta la vista Chiapas and your beautiful people,  it has been an amazing 2 week lifetime for which I will always be deeply grateful.

Trusting your heart's "Yes"

My life has taken more twists and turns in the last 24 hours than the winding road from San Cristobal Las Casas to San Andrés Larránzair, where I have been volunteering as an interpreter for the last week for the amazing Mammoth Medical Missions team.

So... plan A.  Monday through Saturday: Interpret for teaching week and Mass Disaster Conference. All wonderful, amazing experiences, worked my tushy off and loved every minute of it. Sunday: Meet my beloved friends from Guatemala, spend 2 days catching up on the past 32 years and sightseeing in San Cristobal. Tuesday: Fly back home.

That's when life threw me a curve ball. After weeks of planning and anticipation, and traveling all night, my friends got turned back by Immigration because of a missing stamp on a travel document- arrgh! 

Mother’s Day: What had promised to be a joyous get-together turned into a very teary series of FB phone chats, as we came to terms with the new reality: our longed for reunion was not to be this time.

Plan B: Now that you're not busy, it would be great if you could join us for triage day of surgery week on Monday, says David Page, our Mammoth Medical Missions fearless leader. So that was an immediate Yes. How could I not? The opportunity to meet the rest of the surgical team flying in from Mammoth, the prospect tof being able to be a part of the big day of sorting and evaluating patients waiting for a variety of much needed surgeries, the golden blessing of being able to work with our amazing Tzotzil indigenous interpreters as part of a relay interpreting team.  Ok, wonderful. I’ll just taxi buzz back up the winding climb to San Andrés, put in a great day’s work, and fly back home to my hubby and kitty on Tuesday morning as planned.

Plan C: Can I convince you to stay for surgery week?  We could really use your help, says Fru, the irrestistibly charming surgeon I am interpreting for. Long story short, a texting frenzy back and forth with my dear supportive hubby who not only gives me his blessing to stay on but changes my airline ticket for me, and I am here for surgery week and won't be heading back home until Saturday. Back up the mountain, ready to pitch my tent and who knows what will be around the next bend?

This past week has been kind of like navigating rapids (not that I’ve ever been brave enough to do it!) - you just have go with the flow, lean into life’s curve balls, and make the most of those rapids…. and trust that your heart’s Yeses will carry you safely home, with some wild and wonderful thrills along the way.

Here’s to a big Yes to la vida!

Blast off!

Wow, after weeks of anticipation, planning, translating, preparing and packing the day is finally here!  Chiapas Medical Mission 2015, here I come, ready or not.

My fellow interpreter on this mission, Katherine Allen, had to talk me down of my self-imposed last minute melt down. My back pack is too stuffed, I’ll never close it again (You have to understand, I am not a light packer in the best of times, and I am not a camper so putting everything I will need for 10 days, including sleeping bag and mat, into a carry on back pack is not something I do!   I’ll never learn all the terminology in time for the simultaneous lectures to the local doctors. Even though I’ve been madly translating all the lectures all week, there are still a lot of new WORDS to learn, big ones!  I’m too old for this!  What am I getting myself into?!

Okay, deep breaths. Enough of that silliness!  Everything is going to be OK. My adventure begins.  Back to Mexico, the land of my childhood, which I have not set foot in for about 40 years. I wonder if the jacarandas will still be in bloom?

So if you don’t hear too much from me, dear readers, it’s because we may have sporadic or unreliable internet access in San Andrés Larráinzar where we will be, up in the mountains of Chiapas.  Stay tuned and blessings on your adventures, whatever they may be!