Oh clear vision of the future! So elusive, yet so vital to our sense of wellbeing, meaning and most of all – security.
Whether it comes to business, spirituality, romance or whether we have pasta or salad for dinner, from all directions we hear it’s important to know what we want, what our goals are and how our current actions are contributing to it. The great heroes of our time are portrayed as men and women with great vision. It’s one of the stories our society holds very dear.
There’s always been something bugging me about the concept of clarity. I felt as an entrepreneur I badly needed one to be able to create anything of value. But how could I know if it’s THE vision – the one that will lead me in the right direction, resist the changes that I’d experience on the road, the one that’s clear enough and relatable enough for others that I’d like to work with?
I guess I fell into the trap of: never enough… clarity.
I didn’t know that until I decided to follow my shamanic path of intentional interaction with nature and go for a walk in the forest. I lied down on the floor and spent some time setting my intention to gain more clarity about my business vision. I stayed like this for a while, making a conscious choice to let go and surrender to anything nature had for me that day.
Then I roamed. For a couple of hours, just walking around with no specific direction. Until finally I saw a bunch of magic leaves. In our shared reality, they were a bunch of leaves hanging on a spiderweb between the trunks of two trees. But to my open heart, they felt like magic. So I sat down and watched them for a while, trying to see if they had something to say. Some time passed and finally I felt their answer: together with the trunks, the dry leaves were constructing a magic portal I could enter. There was something waiting on the other side.
So I went underneath them, came on the other side of the portal and… Nothing changed hahaha BUT! I started looking around, looking for any clue or hint what I should do next. And I saw one – a broken tree grabbed my attention. So I went towards that. Then again it was ‘Now what?’. I stayed for a while until I saw a green patch of grass in the yellow autumn scenery. I felt drawn to it, so I walked over. Then same thing – sitting still, sensing, observing, waiting – ‘what next?’. Next was a dry river bed. Then another one. Then a tree branch that I had a funny urge to smell. It went like this for a while. Until finally I saw a small man-made shelter. I felt like this was it! It was a clear feeling that I’d reached my destination, my homebase. As soon as I realized this, I saw another bunch of magic leaves hanging between two trees. The magic exit! I passed to complete my journey, expressing my gratitude for all the beautiful lessons I received:
1. Nature’s way to clarity is step by step. Everything we see around, including ourselves was created that way – step by step. Whether there was a design nature was heading towards or not is a matter of dispute (I’d vote for the latter). But one thing is for sure – everything evolved step by step. I felt my path in non-magic reality should follow the same principle. Every time I arrive at a point where I am not sure what to do, wait and feel what draws my heart and attention. And then make a step that way. FEELING what is the right direction and adapting to it, changing my plans if needed, not holding on to a rigid ideal of where I should be heading towards.
2. It’s important to know how the final point FEELS. The moment I saw the shelter, I knew I had arrived. I just knew it, it wasn’t anything rational. It was a feeling of a-ha, this is it! It was a feeling of coming home. A feeling of security, a feeling of – yes, there is something waiting for me at the end and it’s soooo nice to be back home. It was an important reminder to embody that feeling of security, to practice it, to BE it, without attaching it to an external concept (called ‘clarity’ in this case, but could be anything else – from an identity, to a lover, to a job, to money etc).
3. Knowing what you want can come in different flavours. In my case, it came as a clear sense of how I want to operate on my journey. With eyes and heart wide open, with curiosity, with playfulness, with a sense of mystery and joy. I heard at some point that there were painters that begin with a clear vision of their painting already in their minds, whereas others just take the canvas and start drawing and see what comes up. Looking back, all my creative endeavours have followed the latter pattern, but I kept PUSHING myself to be something else, to be more like those heroes of our times, judging this style and my visions as ‘vague’ and ‘not clear enough’. Just like anything else, I believe it’s a choice and that it’s time to be enough!
4. You can create your own magic portals. It’s a thing! I know it sounds funny. But I can’t even begin to tell you how amazing it feels to construct your own reality, your game, your journey in it. Mine began with an intention and a bunch of dry leaves hanging in the air. It’s such a beautiful exercise of getting in touch with nature, with your inner wisdom and intuition. Give it a go! Go out and play! And let me know how it goes :*
Love ya!
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About Lessons in Paradise
I believe we already are in paradise, regardless of where we are and what’s going on in our lives. I believe life is a journey towards becoming aware of this and enjoying as much of it as we can in the limited amount of time we have here. The ‘Lessons in Paradise’ vlog is the space where I share my process of shedding patterns and beliefs that obstruct our view in order to replace them with presence, awe and wonder. It’s also my invitation to you – an invitation to connect and journey together by sharing what we are going through and helping each other see through to the greatest expression of ourselves.
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