Notes on feeling lost and feeling love

To feel love, you’ve also got to know what it feels like to be lost.

Those raised with mounds of love are lucky souls – they grow to be people who are brought joy for seeing the joy of others, who serve others, who give endlessly. But sometimes they don’t realize the extent of love given to them, until they experience being lost.

No it’s not a preferable choice to feel lost. But it’s a moment of growth. And the outcome of growth is a blossom. Imagine staying a seed your entire life… What good is that? Isn’t life a process, a circle of actions?

I remember my first time in Spain, in 2008, when I roamed the streets of Seville alone, with no map. I definitely recommend doing this. It’s knowledge for the brain and freedom for the soul. But I got utterly and hopelessly lost for about 5 minutes. And those 5 minutes felt more like 5 years. Completely turned around, no map, Spanish lacking (and fear of asking, besides), no working phone, and no one in country to call anyway. It was getting dark. Just after losing hope, and honestly praying for a miracle, I found the river, and the river laid the map of the city in my mind, and making my way back to the center, I was saved. The moment of feeling lost made me understand the city and myself within it in a much more profound way.

Now I’m a wandering addict. I prefer to get lost. Planning adventures is an oxymoron anyway, isn’t it.

The healing powers of snow

There are days when you feel gutted. Somehow you’re alive and continuing with the daily nuisances of life. But you don’t notice the incredibly beautiful things around you, because you are physically incapable of doing so. You’re alive, but you aren’t breathing. Your lungs are deflated, your chest concave, and all your other organs have been removed. They’re sitting in a closet somewhere, locked away, until your brain is again considered responsible enough to be in charge of running them at top speed so that you take advantage of life. Every time you fail to keep breathing when one small thing goes wrong, you brains responsibility for your organs is stripped.

Perhaps a gruesome metaphor, but my idea is that too easily we let ourselves feel gutted, destroyed – as if life has literally ripped out our organs.

We blame it on life, anyway. But I think it’s our own doing.

Yesterday I felt gutted. The organ that maintains composure, exploded. The blood cells that distribute tranquility and friendliness, pouring out my pores onto the pavement, wasted.

Close your eyes. Concentrate. Make your lungs inflate. Rest and eat – not bread – but healthy conversation and hugs. Sleep. Wait ’til morning.

Start the day by looked for little victories that fill you, and entrance you .

Sometimes you’re lucky, and as you’re making your morning cup of Italian ground, Kenyan beans – your roommate runs into the kitchen and shouts “está nevando”.

And you feel like a kid on Christmas morning; you want to put on your mittens and snow cap, and run out, rolling on the ground to make a snow angel. But instead you enjoy the hot coffee between your hands while watching out the window as the snow gracefully falls. You put on your battle gear – hat, coat, gloves, scarf, double socks, boots, umbrella. And you make your way to work, being iced with layers of natural white lace. And you’re alone on a quiet, dark street, laughing your head off, giddy with joy.

And by these simple pleasures you find your body full again. And you’re ready to take on the world, begging your soul not to give up so easily next time.

Because there is so much more to love than you can imagine. Love is not an easy game, as popular culture tells us. But it’s a worthwhile venture, to which you will never regret.

(images by aestheticapproach and leftylettering)