Expectations, Hopes, and Dreams
/Traveling through the places where I grew up I expect will trigger many memories and will also serve as a reminder of how much things have changed, as well as how much I have changed and experienced during my life. The impermanence of it all and the gratitude for all that has come & gone is how I feel. Yet my thoughts sometimes wander too far into the future. I think about what my purpose in life is and how much time is left. I realize this is the human condition and I’m sure everyone struggles with these same thoughts. At any age the poignant reality of life is ever present. The 50@50 journey was a new reality that I experienced. During that time the feelings of joy and gratitude found their way effortlessly into the foreground of my being.
“What could I say? Maybe this: the man hunched over his motorcycle can focus only on the present instant of his flight; he is caught in a fragment of time cut off from both the past and the future; he is wrenched from the continuity of time; he is outside time; in other words, he is in a state of ecstasy; in that state he is unaware of his age, his wife, his children, his worries, and so he has no fear, because the source of fear is in the future, and a person freed of the future has nothing to fear.”
The environment back at home has all the trappings of convention, conformity, and routine. So much time is trapped in the noise of cable news, the reality of the world, and the anxiety of the future. The noise can erode one’s hope and I truly feel that hope is the heartbeat of life. As expected, there’s a lot more effort required to keep my head above the noise and in that field of joy & gratitude. This is a huge reason why this journey is important for me to take now. I need to recharge my newfound perspective and further the momentum that I created on the 50@50 journey. I’ve called the previous trip an endeavor of the soul and that remains true for this upcoming journey. I’m convinced that these journeys are a way to exercise my soul, to enrich my spirit, and to strength my being as I travel the path in this incarnation.
I’m hopeful that traveling to my beginnings in Brooklyn and onward to Newfoundland will be a journey full of gratitude and adventure. While I’m looking forward to reflecting on my life and recapturing the feelings of joy I experienced during my 50 days, I’m most excited about the unknown and newness of the experience that awaits me. The wanderlust I’m feeling is the call to exercise my soul and the dreams of what awaits fuels my desire to go.