This is the seventh #notetoself letter, originally sent on March 19, 2012.

Five weeks ago, I arrived at Isla de Ometepe, Nicaragua specifically to work on a permaculture farm. Nearly everything I read about this island was that it was magical. That magic wasn’t fully expounded upon, so I hoped I’d figure out for myself what it was about. As I prepare to leave tomorrow, I realize I understand the gravitational pull this island has on one’s heart and mind from my experience in Balgue. I was actually supposed to leave a few days ago, but it didn’t feel right; I didn’t see it and I didn’t feel it. So I stayed.

During what was to be my final week here, I realized how embedded others had become in this community and how much I felt like I stood on the periphery, here and in it, yet removed at the same time. I wanted to be more of a part of it. There are some incredibly dynamic people here, funny, generous, cooperative… I didn’t want to leave feeling as disconnected as I did and wanted to forge a deeper bond, despite my imminent departure.

This same week, one of the long-term volunteers discovered that she had lice. That realization led to a sort of impromptu communal lice check. One of the women who found out she also had lice never had it before, so she was a bit freaked out. Her behavior after that discovery really impacted me.

We form a gratitude circle, holding hands before we eat while introducing the meal and, if feeling compelled to, mention anything we’re grateful for in the moment. Standing next to me before this ritual, she asked if it was alright for her to hold my hand. I responded with a mocking “no!” Of course, she could hold my hand. Another time after dinner was served, she asked if she could sit next to me. I issued a similar response. Not only do I wear my head wrapped up, proving some degree of protection, but I also wasn’t scared of getting lice by holding hands or sitting next to her. One evening, as a couple who’d been staying at the farm for two weeks said their goodbyes and hugged everybody, she stood back, holding out her hand and said something to the effect of, “I don’t know if you want to hug me, so I’ll just shake your hand.” He dismissively waved his hand and embraced her.

She was so incredibly considerate, aware that others might not feel comfortable and completely respectful of whatever decision they made about wanting her near them. Her behavior made me realize how essential consideration is. Not only is it necessary for and an indicator of a healthy interpersonal relationship, but it works for any scale of relationship: family, personal/professional network, local community, or global community. When people feel as though they aren’t being considered, problems arise. I personally lose it a little bit when I feel ignored, dismissed or not taken into account when I’m in any relationship or community.

Balgue is an incredibly friendly town. Perfect strangers will supply you with a genuine smile and greeting. It’s tranquilo, as they say here. I take showers while looking at a beautiful volcano in the distance, and it’s always stunning. More than that, though, there’s community. There’s a sense of belonging and interconnectedness. Even geographically, this is apparent. While there are individual plots of land, there are paths connecting them, and no one gives you a crazy look for being on their property.

My time on this island has taught me the importance of community and how intentional it always has to be. In order for it to function, we must be considerate. We must be open to sharing ourselves and open to accepting others, not just as how they can be, but how they are. The more we embrace ourselves and others, the better off we’ll all be.

My time on this island has taught me how much I want to be in community and what steps I’m ready and willing to take in order to build it. I’m reminded to be considerate and inclusive.

What’s your relationship to community? Are you a part of one, or do you need to take further action to create it? If you’re in the process of building community, or have built one before, what tips can you share?

love&light…
leandra

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This is the sixth #notetoself letter, originally sent on March 13, 2012.

There is a great irony in my personality. I suppose it’s common amongst others that identify as writers, but knowing it’s not specific to me doesn’t make me any more comfortable with it than if it were only my problem.

I’m a horrible communicator.

Yup. Horrible.

However eloquently I may be able to string together written words, I’m much less gifted with the spoken word, especially when it comes to my most vulnerable relationships. Especially when I’m hurt. Especially when hurt and most other painful emotions are filtered through anger. The only thing I can communicate then is anger. The knives come out. They’re figurative, but the wounds from my words can be just as painful as a literal cut — and they can go deeper.

The result is frequent apologies. I’m sorry for days, but anything said too often begins to lose its power. The last thing you want to do is issue an impotent apology. I fear sincerity won’t be able to carry me for much longer.

In discussing this with my closest friend, she acknowledged her reluctance to have children out of fear of passing on her crazy. I was able to identify with that feeling. As it relates to children, my greatest fear is being a terrible parent. Or really, just not being great.

I asked another friend who has a history with anger how she manages it these days. She told me to imagine my future children standing in the room listening to every word. The imagery was powerful for me. I just hope I can actually employ that tactic in the moment.

Perhaps the most important reminder for me is simply “show your love”. In actions, in words, in silences, in stillness.

It’s easy to give in to our pain and to let the defense mechanisms out to protect us, but those mechanisms aren’t necessarily ours. Or the most up-to-date. We inherit so much of our worlds from those who raised us, most notably our parents. When reacting to situational stimuli, we are most likely employing tactics we haven’t given much consideration to that was learned from people who didn’t give much consideration to them either.

This week I learned how desperate I am for an emotional intelligence upgrade. It’s long overdue. My heart is big and full of love. I want that to be self-evident. I need that to be self-evident.

For you and for myself, I want to remind us to show our love.

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This is the fifth #notetoself letter, originally sent on March 5, 2012.

Henry David Thoreau said, “the mass of men lead lives of quiet desperation.” He lived in the first half of the 19th century and yet those words still contain truth today. It’s sad. Quiet desperation kills the spirit.

Before this trip, I realized how discontent I’d become with my life. My work didn’t matter to me. I wasn’t even sure what I was doing with my “work”. I never knew how answer the “what do you do?” question. I don’t know. Live. That was the response I wanted to give.

I’m a great starter. My starting energy is fresh, empathic and certain. Then, slowly but surely, it’d wane and I’d quit. I’m also a great quitter. My attention usually shifts gears to something else equally engaging.

That’s a pattern I’m really sick of.

A few nights ago, I happened upon an Alicia Keys’ song called “How It Feels to Fly” that’s feeding my soul. With such ambiguous lyrics, I don’t know exactly what she’s talking about in the song, but for me, it makes me think about reaching for my dreams.

“I am riding high, don’t wanna come down.
Hope my wings don’t fail me now.
If I can touch the sky, I’d risk the fall
Just to know it feels to fly.”

How many of our goals are our own? Whose definition of success drives our actions? I can criticize corporate America all I want, but I was a part of the rat race, even if I didn’t have a 9-5. The discontent I feel is the result of not doing things I wanted to do, for whatever reason. There’s so much I want to do, and have wanted to do but have neglected to. This trip is the perfect example of a dream deferred. I’ve always wanted to travel and stay somewhere for a longer period of time. That’s just now happening for me. On the other hand, I appreciate it just the same because I can receive so much of this experience differently than I might have in the past.

Being here has awakened me to my desire to do things I’ve neglected to do, things I let sit in the recesses of my mind and my heart. They were there, alive, but unattended. Living a life with meaning, passion and fulfillment are of incredible importance to me.

Earlier last week, one of the people I’ve been blessed to meet on this trip asked me if I wanted to hike one of the two volcanoes on the island. Of course he wanted to do the larger volcano, Volcan Concepcion, the one we look at everyday. Without hesitation, I said yes. Sure. Why not?

I excitedly embarked upon this journey, too excited to sleep, getting less than six hours of sleep, but giddy. Concepcion is a 8-10 hour hike. It’s also an active volcano. These are things I knew before going up this mountain. It’s also 5,280 feet. And I’ve never hiked before.

Minor details, right?

After about an hour or so into the journey, I started lagging behind. My balance seemed to have stayed behind for this trip and I found myself basically crawling up this mountain. Climbing. We’re supposed to be hiking. Everyone else is upright, except me. My breathing got heavy. At one point, despite inhaling, my lungs were not being filled with oxygen. One of the people I was hiking with advised me to sit down and drink some water. Immediately, I felt better, but it kept happening. I was getting light-headed and felt like I might fall down, which wasn’t an option when climbing a steep mountain with nothing but rocks to “break” the fall.

“I should just stop and head back down,” I thought.

“Leandra, please finish. I want to finish something,” immediately followed.

I was wowed. I want to finish something.

At that point, quitting wasn’t an option. So I kept going. Even though I really didn’t want to anymore. Why was I doing this? Because I set out to was the only reason and the only thing that mattered.

I wound up pretty much hiking by myself since I was always 3-5 minutes behind everyone else, who would intermittently stop and wait for me to catch up. I found a hiking stick that assisted me on my way. It was there for my finding right at a point where I was thinking about quitting, which I spent a lot of time thinking about.

But I didn’t quit; I reached the top. When I got to the crater, I didn’t feel much beyond relief. Not excitement. It was pretty anticlimactic, especially as I considered the fact that I had to now go down.

It took about seven and half hours and a guide holding my hand the entire way down, but I finished. I finished!

Now I look at that beastly mountain that was close to taking my life a handful of times and I feel a little accomplished. I did it.

The only goals that matter are the ones we set for ourselves. The vision of our lives that matters most is the one we hold for ourselves.

What’s your vision? How fully is it realized right now? What are you doing to make it manifest?

I can assure you I’m all about creating a life that matters to me. A life that’s fulfilling because there’s some fulfillment in my initiatives. I want to know how it feels to touch the sky, but my wings will never have a chance to fail me if I don’t try to fly.

I say the same to you. Take the leap. If you have to crawl before you can run, crawl. Go at your pace. Take a breather if you need to.

This is your journey.

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This is the fourth #notetoself letter, sent on February 27, 2012.

So much of life can be enigmatic and perplexing. Undoubtedly, there will be times when you don’t know what to do, how to spend your time, where to invest your energies. For quite a while, that’s been the case with me and my life. That’s part of the reason I’m in Central America.

For the past two weeks, I’ve been living off the grid on a farm. On this 26 acre lot, there’s electricity in three locations and two of those are houses I don’t have access to. If you don’t have a flashlight at night, it sucks to be you, especially when you have to use the bathroom in an outdoor squat toilet. I sleep in a tent advertised as a two person tent, but is only big enough for me and my things. When I lay down, my head and feet are basically connected to it’s perimeter, and I may be 5′4″. May. Two people. Right.

Being an off-the-grid permaculture farm, we seek to maximize production and minimize waste. In my tiny tent is a bag of used tissues, baby wipes and other trash that will eventually be packed into used bottles, which will serve as bricks for some sort of construction. There’s no waste management on this island, so residents usually collect their trash into a pile and burn it. We seek to do something more effective and healthier for us and the environment.

Being in a place where I’m confronted with the idea of food security and trying to create a resource loop where there is no waste just another purpose, I’m heavily analyzing the existence I held in my relatively carefree city life before my time here and wondering what I can and will change. I started researching permaculture and found an opportunity to get certified and practice it for a few months in Haiti this summer, so that’ll be my next big adventure. It wasn’t planned.

Then again, very little of the trip has been. In fact, before I leave Nicaragua, I’ll be taking part of a ten-day meditation retreat. That wasn’t planned either. If I’d made inflexible plans, I’d be spending quite a bit more money at a farm in Costa Rica and unable to do this, which has been on my bucket list for about a year now.

Already, in my month of planless travel, I’ve had some pretty great experiences and acquaintances and come across information that’s changing my life. I knew this trip would do that and I’m so grateful for answering the call to adventure and for following the signs that are shaping my path.

This isn’t only happening to me. It’s happening to you, too.

This is the third #notetoself letter, originally sent on February 20, 2012.

Isla de Ometepe in Nicaragua is an island formed by two volcanoes with an isthmus between them. Many consider it to be a magical place, although I haven’t yet figured out exactly what makes it so, but suspect I will soon. It’s beautiful and there are more signs of nature than the 42,000 people that live here. I’m staying on a permaculture farm with all kinds of good stuff: random greens, herbs, coconut, banana, plantains, Moringa, Mayan breadnut, taro, jackfruit, neem, guava, cashew, cinnamon, mango and so much more.

When I first arrived, I was ecstatic. Everything about this place was cool– the outdoor showers overlooking Lago Nicaragua, the largest lake in Central America, the squat toilets, the compost toilets, the outdoor dorms with amazing views of the sky (basically just a covered platform with a black tarp on one side acting as a wall), the hammock on the platform in a tree overlooking Volcan Concepcion, the solar-powered outdoor kitchen…

I slept horribly the first night. The only two options for mosquito nets was one that was a bit too small for the bed and one that was the appropriate size, but disgusting. It could’ve been from bat droppings, flies, mosquitoes, any number of things. To me, it didn’t matter; it was just really too disgusting for my comfort. The second night, I forgot to charge my cell phone during the hours of 10-3 when we can charge only if it’s sunny. Since the 6:45 meeting is a bit early for me still, I needed an alarm. Rather than asking someone to wake me up, I decided to sleep in the hammock up in the tree where you can see bright, vivid stars. It was windy and cold all night long. Not a good call, but I was still happy about the experience. The third night, an insect flew into my ear while I was sleeping at 2 am. Another lady here helped me drown it with saline solution, but then I was bothered by the fact that there was a dead insect in my ear. The next day was a fumbling exercise in Spanish and patience, spent going to the town clinic, waiting for it to open, hearing it was closed, deciding to go to another clinic and while waiting for the bus to take me to the other side of the island, discovering the town clinic was in fact open but not really equipped to adequately help me. The nurse looked at my ear with a dim light from her cell phone and flushed my ear with a syringe, ejecting a small, black mosquito. Still, something in my ear didn’t feel right, so she urged me on to the other clinic, where I found out that there was no insect but there was “hongo”. Fungus. I have an ear fungus.

After returning to the farm and preparing for bed that night, I wondered what the hell I was doing. I’m in the mountains. With no electricity. Sleeping outdoors. With a mosquito net that’s obviously not very effective. Freaking out about the plethora of bugs grossly outnumbering me. Really, what?

All I’ve ever known was the city, but for at least the next four weeks, I’ll be immersed in the ways of nature, where you can’t quite escape all the natural things city people hate so much, like mosquitoes, flies, wasps, bees, spiders and dirt. My last hot shower was weeks ago and can’t be anticipated anytime soon.

I’m so uncomfortable. And that’s exactly what I love about being here. I’m going to be stretched in ways I can’t be in Brooklyn. What will result isn’t yet known to me, but I’m taking all of it in stride in preparation for an amazing transformation and a great story.

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It took years for this song to find me, but when it did, it stopped me in my tracks and immediately became the most played song of the moment. It’s lifted my spirits, healed my heart, even helped me climb a volcano when all I wanted to do was quit; I persisted. Thanks, Alicia.

This is the second #notetoself letter I sent during my trip, sent on February 13, 2012.

Buenas! I hope this letter finds you in good health and high spirits. I’m coasting on the joy of so many blessings in the past week, but also a bit weighed down by the reality of the lessons I’m still learning from my bag being stolen a little over a week ago in Costa Rica.

I’m now in Granada, Nicaragua, which on the surface is a quaint and charming colonial city with humongous houses and beautiful, colorful architecture. With the feel of a small town, the pace is comfortably slow and inviting. I can walk at 2 miles per hour here and not feel hurried. It’s a nice change of pace from Brooklyn and Manhattan.

But travel not even a mile outside the city center and experience the stark oppositional reality that this is the second poorest country in the western hemisphere. Tiny, wooden shacks with tin roofs. Dirt roads. Normalized poverty. I’m accustomed to seeing…more. The standard of living in Nicaragua is lower and visitors like me are thought to be wealthy simply because we can travel, regardless of how budget that travel is or what was sacrificed to do so. Here, I’m faced with how much I have and how much I’m accustomed to having.

On Friday, what I presume to be the purpose of my bag being stolen hit me. Hard. Release your attachments.

Release your attachments. Duh. What we hold onto begins to possess us and we lose. When we walk with our hands open, ready to receive whatever is truly for us, greater and grander miracles begin to enter our lives. So much was taken from me in an instant, yet it didn’t take long at all for the space to be replaced with something else, with enough and more at the very same time. Granted, I had a better bag. I had some of my favorite clothes, but I’ve been shown a tremendous amount of love and generosity that at times has overwhelmed me. I can’t even believe it myself. Friends, former co-workers, and even blog readers have sent me money on PayPal, so my costs to replace what was taken have been drastically cut down, resulting in little negative financial implications. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

My god mother and mother devised a plan to overnight my god sister, Ysatis, a package that she would bring to Nicaragua from Miami. Ysatis works for Delta part-time but is still able to fly for free. Her round-trip fare to Managua: $55. Genius. I haven’t seen her in years so I was doubly excited — get my things, see my god sister. Great. Thank you, thank you, thank you.

I found another backpack, and was able to put on clean clothes and moisturize my skin. I’m happy.

Release your attachments.

My time in Central America is prompting thoughts of expatriatism, a long-held goal of mine. Here, I can see the stars, I can slow down, simplify, learn another language and expand myself with exposure to other cultures by traveling. I can lower my cost of living while dedicating myself to a cause I believe in and acquiring new skill sets.

There’s this little problem: I love Brooklyn.

Release your attachments.

But maybe my place is really somewhere else.

My bag being stolen was a reminder that we can’t always have what we think we need, or it won’t always take the shape we think it will. My blessings on this trip came, more or less, after my bag was stolen.

According to Buddhism, attachment is the cause of all suffering. I need to release, let it flow and let my cup runneth over. More is coming. Better. I already see and feel it.

This lesson is repeatedly being revealed. Yesterday, I found out Whitney Houston died. We never get back any of the time we spend stuck and attached. Life is about moving forward, evolving.

Release your attachments.
Release your addictions.
Continually move forward.
Continually adapt.

I’m moving forward with my trip, onto an island where I hope to find some quiet and connect with the organization I’d like to volunteer with for the remainder of my time. Being two of eleven weeks into my trip and being taught pretty early on to release my attachments, I’m going to take it as a fundamental lesson of the trip and start letting go of everything I’ve been holding onto. Some attachments have been longstanding, despite my knowing to move on.

Are you holding onto something you know you should let go of — an idea, person, thing, outcome, etc.? What major lesson are you learning right now that’s been showing up in several areas of your life? What’s your world like?

love&light…leandra

I’ve only been in Costa Rica for one week, and have learned some pretty big lessons. Traveling is by far one of my favorite things to do because it throws you out of your comfort zone, leaving you with less armor to shield yourself with, which can, if you let it, result in purer knowledge of self.

You live. You learn. You adjust. You get over, under and through if you have to simply because…well, you have to.

At the time of my last writing, I was in Tamarindo. From there, I took a seven hour bus ride to the capital of Costa Rica, San Jose. I stayed the night, woke up and took a two and half hour bus ride to Cariari on my way to Tortuguero, a village on the northeast coast of the country. In Cariari, my backpack was stolen. My bag was one of the last things to be loaded, thus one of the first to be unloaded, while I was one of the last to exit the bus. By the time I got off, it was gone. Nearly everything I needed for my day-to-day living during the next two and half months: shoes, clothes, vitamins, medicines, toiletries, etc. Gone.

Too shocked for an immediate reaction, I wanted to cry, but couldn’t. After I realized this was no mistake and I wasn’t going to haphazardly see the thief with my bag so I could run them down and take it back (yes, I really thought of doing this…quite a number of times), I did cry. As I walked down the streets of a foreign city, wondering what to do next. Do I keep moving in the direction of Tortuguero? Nothing clean to put on the next day, or to wear to sleep. What to do?

For a split second, I thought to return home, but immediately dismissed that possibility as a ludicrous idea bred purely from fear. Instead, I went to a soda, typically a small, family-run restaurant with traditional Costa Rican fare at really low prices, and got something to eat. As I waited on my food, I pulled out my journal and got reacquainted with my inner self.

You always knew this trip was about cultivating stronger faith. Here’s the test.
Be resilient.

I had nothing to gain by cowering and turning around at this setback, despite the grandness of its size in the moment. Really, everything I lost can be replaced. Will it necessarily be easy? No. Will it be worth it? Without a doubt, I firmly believe the answer is yes.

I trudged forward with my plans to go to Tortuguero. Sitting next to me on the two and half hour bus ride to Pavona and the hour and half boat ride the rest of the way was a man named Leo. The tour guide who helped us all get accomodations: Leonard. A fellow traveler: Leo. In the two nights, I’ve been here, I’ve met two other men named Leo/Leonard. Leandra is the feminine version of Leonard. I took it as a sign that I’m on the right track.

There will always be obstacles and setbacks, but they don’t have to be the ruin of your plans. Key to making a setback a setup for a comeback is a positive attitude about everything. I was even a bit proud of myself for persisting and for changing my attitude so quickly.

Speaking with a Tortuguero local, she said, “why don’t you just go home?” Surprised by the notion, I smiled and said, “Because I’ve only been here for four days.”

I honestly believe losing my things was supposed to be a part of my journey. For what, I can’t yet say, but I have my suspicions that it’s part of a larger plan that will be revealed in due time.

Great generosity has been displayed to me, from fellow travelers, friends, and former co-workers. I’ve received a few PayPal donations and will likely ask for help, something I’m often not so good at. We have to humble ourselves though; everyone needs a helping hand at some point. Now, I suppose is mine.

One of the biggest lessons I’ve learned this week is that we are stronger than we know. We have more assistance than what’s immediately in front of us. If we persist, we will surprise ourselves by what we can accomplish.

Has something like this ever happened to you? If it did, what did you do? What would you do differently? If this happened to you, what do you think you would’ve done? What’s the biggest lesson you’ve learned this week?

I hope all is well in your world and that if it isn’t, you’re able to see some design behind the chaos.

love&light…

Source: Mreeuh Chang

The recent absence of my online presence isn’t exclusively related to being busy or mentally preoccupied. That’s part of it. Another part of it, actually, the biggest part of it, is the recurring struggle I’ve had with allowing myself to be open. I’m set on finding the balance between protecting myself and my life and being an open book. I’d like to share myself in a thoughtful, meaningful way, not recklessly over-share.

Posing this dilemma to a friend, he said, “But the work you do requires you to be honest. All creatives have to be.” It hit me, as it occasionally does at times before disappearing again, that there is something to this process, to this learning and sharing of mine. It isn’t haphazard or reckless; it’s necessary — for me and for whomever my words touch. I forget that my brand of creativity is more specific to how I think and applying understanding to grow. The art that resonates the most is that which is the most honest. My work will only resonate with others when I’m brave enough to open up and share my journey.

So, there it is. I struggle with being open. I struggle with maintaining clarity about my path. But I get it back. I’m here for a purpose and I unfailingly believe in purpose.

I’ll stop being scared. I’ll open up a bit. A few months back, I had a moment, ripe with reminders for myself. Epiphanies flooded me, and as they cascaded, I wrote them on my mirror. The picture above captured the result of that moment. It became a #notetoself I was happy to immortalize.

For years, I’ve been meaning to set aside the time to create a cohesive vision of how I’d like my life to look. Every area: health and fitness, career, finances, emotional life, spiritual life, social life, romantic life, etc. Occasionally, I’ll remind myself that fuzzy targets don’t get hit and when it comes to understanding exactly what I want, there’s often quite a bit of fuzziness.

At the end of the month, I’ll be embarking upon one of the scariest and simultaneously most exciting adventures of my life: I’m taking off to Central America for two and half months. The why is multifold. The timing is just perfect. It’s winter and the only way I enjoy winter is with some sun and warmth; wearing socks indoors and sleeping with hoodies and heating pads isn’t my thing. Additionally, I’m not sure when else all the factors in my life will align perfectly to create another opportunity like this one.

Before I take this journey, I’ve begun to start critically examining my life. There are gaps that need to be closed and the first step is identifying where I am and where I’d like to go. The quote above is helping me maintain my motivation for actually completing this process. It’s my wish that it’s of assistance to you as well.

Here’s a short video of an impromptu interview before he was arrested.

Read more about this here.