Born to…

Happy to be back on track.With my readers. Also to my optimism. I rarely stop writing, notes everywhere I am, yet - to arrive at this moment in full presence of deep sharing - it means much more to me. So I honour you and also myself by practically not writing a piece here when I am being eclipsed. So that was April.

I would love your opinion too by telling me what do you happen to see in this photo?

I was practically awaken by this view on my ferry ride back home one evening during the April eclipses. From where you stand and read, I supposed you will say -well that is the city ,right, and all its glorious neon lights?The city that never sleeps. And here I was napping on the boat, finding myself falling into a trance sleep for about 5-10 minutes to wake up almost by an invisible hand and to an incredible view. The view was a gigantic ship, just crossing over our route, full of light and marked by these pillars, a view that I encountered for the very first time. It was a ship like a city. The containers were not that visible, the crates were not that visible, only the pillars, their symmetry, their colours and homogeneity.A moving structure so imposing that I could not stop staring at it.

It all happens to merge indeed. The city I was living behind me and the ship moving along all forming one shape in the snapshot I managed somehow to take. The red full moon overlooking it all. A bit shadowed by the clouds and trust me- not less powerful.

I would sincerely admit I have few themes simmering inside of me to chat with you about and I would start today by few open brainstorms around stability ,about safety net, about security, about our stories around those. About my stories around those- pardon me.

I have this sticker on my desk from one artist ,singer, yogini, dancer,painter, meditator I love, her name is Daphne Tse and you can all find her on Spotify. “Finding water” is one of my favourite albums at all times, I find it so relaxing and hopeful. I believed I might have mentioned her already… sorry, short memory. Please go and check her work out.

Her marketing message below talked instantly to me:

” Born to sing, dance and love!” Daphne Tse

This talked to me because of the confidence of her calling. This talked to me because every artist resonates with me on various levels- no matter if I have any skill to practice their art(I am no singer, at least yet!), or any trials, or any experience prior - and yes, every artist resonates through the fundamental and primal power of creativity. This creative force pulls me towards discovering so many new artists and their art forms. Some are very specific - perhaps prolific illustrators all their lives and now artists and teachers, some writers, some finding their craft in a multitude of forms of expression.

The statement in itself pulled me today to wonder… what are we born to do, what are we born to be, have we found what are we born to…. Are we still exploring and being at the same time and finding what are we born to be? Are we becoming? Are we arriving? Are we settled? Are we moving along carrying our lights and pillars with us as the big ship? Are we the city we were born into or are we the city we move to?

There is suddenly so much curiosity arising. For me at least. And hey,I do not want us to go into any spiralling or guilt or “not-enoughness” thinking if we do not have the answer today.

The beautiful message though let me go back to my own ‘alchemist” journey. And here are some revelations….

Born to learn foreign languages.

Born to be in more than one village, cities, countries, continents, mountains, islands, lands.

Born to fly.

Born to understand people and deepen my empathy towards myself and others.

Born to find joy.

Born to write and read avidly and take in as much as I can.

Born to love my family and born to live alone.

Born to honor my ancestors and their immense sacrifices they made to raise us( this took also time to develop and I am happy to have found it back in my deepest corners of my heart).

Born to honor the new generations bringing us so much delight only by their pure presence.

Born to be independent and born to love so much too.

Born to tend to flowers and be in awe in nature.

Born to connect,resonate,vibrate.

Once you start, trust me, practice this exercise, you will find so much you were born to be. So much there in ourselves.

I also think that my answer might have puzzled you in a way. Perhaps most of us see this as a huge question that would demand for our big calling, big career path, big vocation, big title, big external validation.

I chose to distance myself for a while from these limitations. And this is freeing so much space inside me- it is a work of wonder.

Thinking back to the alchemical journey I would share also with you these stages really that I have been through:

• Leaving home, leaving my roots, leaving my room, to go to university was a huge freeing moment - moving to a big city and all …..

• Leaving university I have found myself leaving also my country exploring a job opportunity to hone on my foreign languages skills and earn better money….

  “Born to be in multiple countries”- remember what I have said earlier - well, it has never dawned on me that early in my uni years but I can tell you so much - a lot of us aspired to have a better life outside of the regime we were brought up into and was not a novelty per-se. I believe now- good years later, that some unknown layer in us carries that information and propels us further.

  It gives us this confidence.I never doubted.

  The beautiful story of the Alchemist is that we part with our own roots -the roots that we are aware of, the roots that we are born into, the blood roots -and we travel the world to engage our curiosity, our avid need for exploration, our longing to become own own person….and to settle, find, plant new roots or seeds.

  We carry our roots with us, in order to bloom into a new self and perhaps settling for new roots somewhere. Or perhaps remain nomadic and blooming seeds everywhere we go. Traces of our being. Traces of our perfume.Traces of our own energy.

• Waking up in a new country - takes you through a bit of awakening - we literally have to find quickly who were we at our core, what is our ethics, what is our integrity about combined with sudden loss of ground. It can be challenging at times that I might say and we can dive on this topic in volumes - especially us, who were a bit more engaged in this nomadic way of living.

  Friends and community help tremendously. I have been lucky enough to be taken care of in amazing ways - even if I mastered the local language very poorly.

• Being in a new country makes is long for stability and roots ( hello -we were just escaping one minute ago) ,and this happens indeed. And I would say it out loud - for whoever is in this stage now - furniture does not stabilise you as a person.

  At the beginning a lot of us, nomads, keep the home decoration minimalistic, to key pieces. Then we press our decorating switch on and we wonder what elements we might add, then we say, of I would like to invest since now I will be here for a while and suddenly we make a home and buy this or that, and then we happen to move to another country. This time we might say -well, I would like to have my own things there and we carry a big trunk of things with us. I would laugh today and I also find it equally sad - I had to look one month for a new home to fit my amazing gorgeous teak table that I have dreamt of for ages. To have guests, and dinners and cook for my people. It did all those things and it was lovely. It was just not necessary. And expensive. And the wrong measure for finding my stability.

• Being in a beautiful home with your precious loved possessions it is wonderful.For those of you born to live this way, I am very happy. I had to accept and admit that I was simply not born to hold on possessions and I resonate much more now with the wonderful world of impermanence. The way I chose to enhance my home now is through beautiful and light possessions that I can easily leave behind next day if I have too. No attachment to a teak table.

• The same goes with all my own stories around security. Once we embrace change as a constant should we be born into it or not, we also embrace fluidity, and the power of reinventing ourselves. Looking back I found many times hard to detach myself from a location, a home simply because it was telling myself a story around security. Or simply because for example - while life was challenging and was uprooting me on one hand, a working place was offering me a sense of grounding.

  They are all valid. And necessary. In their own time. In their own time.

• Born to find my true self. This is the calling of the alchemist in me.

  Born to find the path to be naturally and unapologetically myself.

  Born to expand the space and allow for all to be, one calling or more than one ….

  Counting on my own straight spine to carry and hold me. And supported lovingly by connection, stories we share, lovely meals we concoct and improvise, practicing presence and seeing ourselves with new eyes and self-compassion too.

• Born to be kind.

  I would lovingly close with another artist I love- Savanna, and the song is called “She moves me” -she says in her introduction( I only quote briefly here) “I was born and raised in the place where the mountains meet the water. I grew up listening closely to the winds that rush over the Salish Sea and watching the eagle fly freely above the cedar trees.”And she also adds” As a self-produced artist, the music I make is a reflection of the relationship I cultivate with the land that nourishes me. My wish is that you feel safe, grounded and playful as you listen to my creations.Bless”

Sweet cool summer breeze whispers through my hair
Hello, I am here
You are felt
You are held
And all the while I thought I was the one experiencing the wind
Turns out She loves to kiss me back
How funny to realize that She is moving me
And oh how She moves me
How She moves me
And how funny to realize that Fear is really Courage becoming known
And that tears are really Joy finally coming home
Outside of me
Beyond me
From within me
I am blessed
For knowing She
For letting Her move me
And oh how She moves me
How She moves me

Source: LyricFind

Songwriters: Savanna Jones-Martin