Sometimes I stop and reflect on how fundamentally different my daily life is from, say, 5 years ago. Far from missing it, I shudder at the very thought of ever returning to such a painful and unsatisfying lifestyle. That I now live in what I regard as an almost wholly alien culture thousands of miles from my “motherland” is possibly a more dramatic aspect of those differences but the reality is that it is not the obvious change of “venue” that houses the essence of my new life. No, it is more about the absence of being driven to prove myself and bear the burden of meeting liabilities, freedom to do what feels right in the moment and to reflect on and learn from my experiences.
It is not that life here is mystical or inspiring in itself, but what it catalytically facilitates is indeed special and would have proved far harder to bring about in England. Far from finding ‘paradise’, it is not about escapism. On the contrary, it is to facilitate the finding of myself at a deeper level, to expand my understanding of the real ‘me’ and extrapolating from the increased awareness such things as may be useful to others in time.
That sounds all very grand but from day to day it can involve a great deal of frustration at the slow pace of development as I endure the remains of the addiction I brought with me from my former home, the addiction to driving things forward, to being busy, to achievement to validate my existence. As I train myself to relax the mental muscle of this addiction and rest my awareness in what is present at the time and in the connection with everything that it brings as a result, I pull away from performance in favour of blissful peace of mind. It is, without a doubt, the greatest thing I have been able to achieve and something that brings the greatest overall happiness, not needing to achieve at all in order to feel good about myself or to feel useful or worthy.
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