While there have been many profoundly moving experiences throughout my travels, there is always one that tugged a bit harder at my heart strings. In India, it was visiting an orphanage for children with special needs and disabilities. In Greece, it was being on a boat with my best friends in the middle of the Aegean Sea – remembering how lucky we are to be alive and able in each moment. In Bali, it was befriending our house host Miss Tia.
Miss Tia experienced a world full of heartache. Her story touched us all, but what moved me most was her ability to still give so much of her raw emotion and reveal such fresh wounds to complete strangers. She made heartache feel beautiful and seriously left us all bawling.
I went to Bali with expectations of finding myself. As cliche as it sounds I wanted to chase the Eat, Pray, Love dream. To be immersed in a spiritual experience and come out a refined, less lost version of me. But there I was – sitting on the back of a scooter, hands free, speeding up a narrow winding road, breathing. Just breathing. I can’t remember the last time I did only that. I somehow tapped into what I was looking for without guidance, without a psychic or “healer” telling me what my next move should be.
We think such small problems are monumental, and even if they actually are, we allow ourselves to waste time over analyzing every word said. We pride ourselves in only exerting good energy, yet we consume our minds with the bad. We question ourselves and our motives, like there’s a finite tangible answer – but there isn’t. There never is. The best we can do is live fully in each moment, and leave hurt and heartache behind.
Two weeks in Bali allowed me to barely scratch the surface, in more ways than one. I can’t wait to continue to travel and experience the incredibly diverse landscapes, cultures and people this world has to offer.
“I’ve heard her called a quitter for leaving and aimless wanderer. But not all who wander are aimless, especially those who seek truth beyond tradition, beyond definition, beyond the image.” – Mona Lisa Smile
