23-24 June, Preparation
Preparation for a world trip is both psychological and practical. For the most part I have found myself working on practicalities. The past 3 weeks have been extremely busy as I had to complete Harmony workshops for a Council working on team empowerment and solving issues to ensure a positive and open workplace. I finished the 4th workshop with a tentative agreement on ways to work together. I was told by staff that they had breakthroughs and the manager felt there had been a shift in the working environment. I find myself reflecting on how far we have to go to address emotional intelligence and conflict resolution in the workplace and through that medium, families and general relationships. Much of the work I have discovered is airing issues in an environment that is exploratory rather than condemning and training staff in tools to resolve conflict and create space for differences. So much of my time has been drawn to workshops promoting positivity.
I have had to get rid of all my possessions as part of this new beginning. I feel the lightening of the load and living more freely is important, I am not sure if I am returning. Although I have the strongest feeling of going ‘home’. For me this is returning to my true self. I sat in my small unit surrounded by possessions and reflected on the belief that I am not materialistic, that appears to have faded as the reality of how much I have purchased based on what I believe I ‘need’ is evident. The needs as I am well aware as a Marketing Analyst are derived from stimuli in a society engrossed with buying and selling what we ‘need’. In reality I felt myself emerge out of a lifetime of conditioned accumulation sensing disgust at how much of the earths resources I am personally consuming without much usage. There was no negative stimuli to suggest to me my wastage for indeed in western society we are saliently rewarded for accumulation as many comment on the style of a home and the latest gadgets. I am not interested anymore in this and will redefine my direction to work on inner wealth rather than exterior privileges the earth cannot afford.
The world trip is particularly designed for me to look inwardly at my own environment and where I find conflict and peace within myself. Already I found myself stressed by imagined concerns as I was packing. A belief my bag was too heavy as the scales misread the weight. I also had words with the credit card people believing they had not sent my pin number when in fact I had received it but not realized. My fear of having credit cards stolen or money did play on my mind and I overrode this reminding myself of how much we have here, so what if someone took from me. I am also reminded of Byron Katie’s The Work which states how do you know you need something, you have it, if it is stolen, how do you know you don’t, it is gone. I like this philosophy as it allows life to come and go without resistance. This is the purpose of my inner work to stop the ego demanding its needs be met but instead allowing the world to come and go and finding peace even in discomfort.
Additional stresses occurred through tiredness as I was informed at the airport that British Airways had double booked my ticket, I was offered compensation, a hotel room and meals. I decided to take it as it is part of the adventure and I am feeling very exhausted from the past three weeks. When I came to the hotel I became frustrated at the fact that I couldn’t make a local call without being charged a fortune. I resented this as money has always been tight for me, I had to go to a pay phone and had little frustrations of not being able to make contact with those picking me up in Bangkok, I did get onto my friend, but the taxi driver didn’t answer. I found myself laughing at my crankiness and recognizing how tiredness allows one to be more critical and less loving of others. Again, the idea of accepting what is without negativity arose in my mind.
I have met a few wonderful people already. I lovely lady who is living in Papua New Guinea told me of her life with her husband, an Australian, who is a HIV doctor there. She explained the violence in Port Moresby and the inability to walk at night or even in the day. Much drinking and idleness there it seems. She has a Thai community she connects with and is deeply happy with her husband who she felt to be a soul mate. She was initially angry about not being able to proceed to Thailand but we talked about fate and going with the flow of what is. We met and had a very deep conversation about life, fate and spiritual sites around the world. We had much in common. I gave her my wrap to keep warm as Sydney was very cold. I also had the priviledge of meeting another younger woman, who was Indian in appearance but grew up in Thailand. She told me how kind and lovely the people in the North East of Thailand are. She was studying her masters in Journalism but felt cynicism about the world, the violence, and where it is all going. She didn’t want to have children as the future was uncertain. I spoke to her of my positive attitude that the world has to collapse as the economic and environmental situation is not sustainable. However, I believe we are about to evolve as a world civilization and I spoke to her of the Mayan prophecy which I first discovered writing poetry. She also was aware of this, and to my surprise, very open to the prospect of a new world emerging. Her cynicism turned more positive as I gave her permission to seek her happiness and to not worry about the world, but instead live in the moment and be grateful for every day. When the challenges come we can only endure the changes. I have no desire to join in the collective fear or misery I am going to live fully and with real hope that we can create the change. She and I also spoke of the Law of Attraction and I reminded her if you believe that the mind can electromagnetically attract into your life positive/negative experiences then there is no reason why peace cannot be created by a positive state of mind.
I also had an opportunity to speak to a Chinese waitress who discussed her version of peace with me and felt that the world was in trouble. She indicated she would like to go to Burma but it was unstable and so much violence in the world. I said peace starts with us, we must first be the change, if you want a peaceful world then you have to look within. She looked at my earrings that were given to me for my birthday. They were Chinese, she said they mean world peace and safety. My trip will be safe.
So now I have a space to fully observe myself without worries of survival but looking to see what disturbs my peace and look at transforming that.