The Gift Is There... You Just Need To Unwrap It

This day last year I was in San Jose, California. I shared the evening with two friends where I had been camping out on their one-bedroom unit floor for what was to be the second night. I was wedged between the lounge settee and the television on a blow-up mattress on the floor, blocking all entry to the small kitchen. The inn was full!

I had been nurtured by these two sweet souls that tucked me under their wing, and shared their small but sacred space with me whilst I was regathering my spirit and identifying myself with a new creative adventure. Now solo, and currently moving from place to place.

We went out to dinner and shared the experience of watching a ball game and devouring our meals at a local sports bar. The noise level of the restaurant became intoxicating with the shouts, shrills and cheers as the teams were scoring or indeed being beaten by the opponents.

I reflect back on my life history of moving home so many times, twenty-six in all over thirty-two years. Neither of my parents had any association with the armed forces or some other career path that encouraged such a rapid and consistent change in the display of life circumstances.

They'd just chosen a more nomadic life-style, moving to where they felt they needed to be next. Whilst this may seem like a disruption to life, it taught me a great lesson in flexibility and embracing change. It taught me the gift of looking for the new opportunities and adventures to experience. The impression of this path is conditioned in my being, and I'm embracing the change now, thankful for the references in life I can draw on.

Leaning on the bar and toying with my food, I'm thinking to myself, "I know I will be OK. Better than OK." I then decide, "I'm going to have the best year of my life!"

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Today I'm back in San Francisco, having flown in yesterday. I met up with a great friend of mine who I connected with last year during my most amazing adventures...

We went out for lunch at a local restaurant to catch up on the details of each others lives.

My friend shared with me the considerable and rather drastic changes that have occurred for her and her partner especially over the last twelve months and I listened with a heart space full of love, and certainty for her, that everything will "be Ok. Better than OK."

I didn't voice this out loud. I didn't need to. She understood. I just know from my own personal life experience, and the enormous amount of those experiences stacked solidly on top of one another in such a compressed time period in the recent year, that life evolves and changes, and that everything happens for a reason.

Sometimes we become aware of the reason very early in the experience. Sometimes it may take years ahead, to reflect back in hindsight to witness the miracle of events that led us to where we are meant to be at that given moment. And that if 'this' hadn't happened, and 'that' hadn't happened, then the result would be a different outcome.

Everything happens for a reason. If we are temporarily stuck in a place of foggy recognition of this, then the lesson simply hasn't been integrated into your soul yet. It will, if you allow it. And then you have the added benefit of all the wonderful gifts revealing themselves. They were always there. You've just now learned how to unwrap them.