Traveling Insights: An Inside Perspective

Endings for me are often painful. I suck at goodbyes. I think in part this comes from the realization that whatever the amazing thing that happened - that moment, the summer, the midnight adventure - will never happen again. This is how I felt leaving Lida Farm this past weekend. While I know that my relationships will always stay intact, that chapter of my growth and evolution is over. A part of my heart now permanently resides at that farm, in the same way I left some of it with John and Karen at Pendleton's Country Market when I moved to Minnesota. It's inevitable when you become so intimately connected with the place - and the people. Farming grounds you in a way that can't be ignored. The plants, the weeds, the plant starts...they need tender love and care, and they'll tell you outright when it's overdue. On the other hand, as much as endings are challenging for me, I find myself often seeking a change of scenery. There's something about being in a new pl...

I don't know about you, but it seems like time is pretty warped these days. Sometimes things that happened a week ago feels like three months, and other times something that happened three months ago felt like it was just yesterday. I'm sure it doesn't help that I've physically relocated, turned town a fellowship, enrolled in summer classes, and decided to launch a consulting business. In short, a lot of shit is going on. And I think the coming of CSA deliveries on Mondays and Tuesdays here at Lida Farm are one of the reasons why the weeks of summer feel like they are flying by.  Somewhere along the way, in the many adventures of the last six or eight weeks, I decided to eliminate the reputation I have of not finishing things - of half-assing it and calling it good. When I say half-ass that's more like me not putting in 120% to get over my perfectionism, but what I'm talking about here is commitment.  Oxford has some funny definitions of the word: "the stat...

Qué causalidad que cuando me encuentro en Costa Rica para las vacaciones de primavera, mis clases de la universidad cambian para ser virtuales, mi trabajo de investigación tiene límites de viajar por el trabajo y puedo hacer todo de mi computadora. Mientras todos están de pánico en el resto del mundo, estoy aquí disfrutando la playa mientras tomo alguna bebida tropical y mirando el mar. Cuando estás abierta a lo que la vida te trae, no puedes evitar que esta situación es increíble. Único. Y voy a aprovechar de todo que el universo me está dando en este momento. ¿Qué—o quién—me trajo el universo? Pues, primero, un compañero de baile, una fuente de espíritu positivo y ojalá que un compañero de vida desde ahora en adelante. Hablaré más de eso en los días que vienen, pero en este momento, quiero expresar mi gratitud por la felicidad, el sol, este ambiente tropical en que me encuentro hoy, y ojalá por dos semanas extra que esperaba inicialmente. Bueno, para los lectores que e...

Whether you’ve taken a few trips on your own or you’ve never traveled solo before, it’s never a bad idea to consider the way your thought processes—i.e. your ability to handle stress—impacts your travel experiences. It’s amazing how simple planning strategies (such as allowing yourself extra time, minimizing the number activities in a day, assuming less than ideal conditions) allows you to be present and enjoy the moment with the strangers in your company. On Day 1 of my first trip to Costa Rica, I felt eternally grateful for for a year’s worth of training my mind to operate differently so that I'm so calm I can actually meditate in the line for customs and immigration. How’s that for mindfulness?!  Here's a simple list of 5 mindset shifts that have helped me while traveling alone, which you may find helpful as you embark on your own journey: Mindset shift #1: Always expect to pay $15 for a single food item at the airport If it turns out that the price is an...

I am on a quest. My quest started, I believe, the day I was born. When the forces that be put me on this planet, I think they had something pretty rad in mind. Till this day I'm not quite sure what it is, but my ability to imagine, design, manifest, and guide certain aspects of my life to channel a particular kind of energy - whether love, kindness, gratitude, joy, forgiveness, sorrow, or rage - has most certainly improved. I am so grateful for the people in my life who have been real with me. The ones who call my bullshit and know when I'm not being honest with myself. I'm grateful for everyone who told me to listen to my gut, follow my intuition, and trust that things have a way of working themselves out. I am grateful for all of the personal development podcasts, books, and blog articles that instilled in me a greater control of my own mindset to open doors that I didn't even know existed. "Purposes are deduced from behavior, not from rhetoric or sta...