My living room has piles of folded clothes, packets of dehydrated food labeled, breakfast, lunch and dinner. There is a small pile with a knife, a compass, flashlight and a guide book. A tent sits alone in its own pile.
An adventure is being prepared for. Backpacking for 5 days on the Superior Hiking Trail. Everything needed must be carried on your back. Food and a way to purify your water. You will be burning more calories than normal so you want plenty of food but also are carefully watching the weight of your pack.
This trip has been thought about for some time. Not the details but the idea of it. Now the details are being sorted through and it is all coming into form.
Just a few days ago there was no purification system, no cooking kettle, no compass. There is still no cooking unit.
But it is all coming together one step at a time, one detail at a time.
Packs have been filled to approximate the hiking weight and a short hike taken. Hiking boots broken in.
An idea comes to us. Floats into our minds. Formed from the ether. It may be a unique idea or something your have read about and want to try yourself.
Maybe the idea will take some financial investment. Maybe it will require a move. Maybe it will require you to carry a heavy backpack several miles a day.
When the idea comes in it is never fully formed. It is just the first thought or glimpse but it may carry a feeling or an emotion with it. A feeling of “YES!” ”This would be so great! This would be so FUN!” This would be so rewarding!”
Life is rich and rewarding when we have the courage, spunk or spontaneity to follow that idea. We never really know where it will lead us but we feel alive when we allow ourselves to live from this place.
We just start. We let ourselves daydream about what it would be like to experience that idea if we followed it to its end. We do not need to know the details at this point. Maybe the idea will even morph into something else. But we allow ourselves to follow the excitement of the idea.
We can get too “serious” about our lives. About what we think we can or cannot do. About what we can give ourselves permission to do. The money, the time, the kids, etc. We can come up with many excuses to not follow our ideas, our daydreams…….
The point is, you do not need to know how it will end. You can just start by letting the idea flourish in your imagination. You can let yourself imagine yourself in that place, with those people etc. You can Google ideas around it. If we simply allow ourselves to be open, things have a way of creating themselves. We can just come along on the ride………..
Before you know it, you may be strapping on a backpack:) m
Melanie,
You will enjoy the hike! I just returned from two hikes in one day: One to Upper Emerald Pool in Zion National Park, and the other to Angel’s Landing, also in Zion, with my Tom, my grandson Jace, and three good friends from China. It was awesome! The view was stupendous! My body and my new hiking sticks cooperated well! Try a “frog towel.” You can get them at Scheel’s. If you wet it, it will keep you cool for hours!
Nancy