It can be easy to think that the rest, peace, stillness, and wholeness we seek exist in some ‘other’ place or time. Just out of reach from our normal, daily lives. That we need to go to a monastery or an ashram to find it. Or that we need to get away in order to uncover it.

We often tell ourselves that the restlessness we feel is a product of our circumstances—that if we could just change the scenery, find the right vocation, or reach the next milestone, we would finally arrive at a place of peace. We imagine that "the hurry" is something happening to us, rather than something living in us. But what happens when you finally reach the destination you dreamed of, only to find that the passenger you tried to leave behind has been sitting in the backseat the whole time?

Somewhere along the way, I think I misunderstood. I assumed that to grow healthy roots, you had to sacrifice your wings. Like it was one or the other. I am beginning to realize that, to grow healthy roots, the presence of wings is not an impediment, but essential.

Allow me to explain.

It is said that the legendary investor Warren Buffett kept a "too hard" box on his desk. Any investment he was considering that he couldn’t fully understand would go straight into that box. I wonder if we don’t all have a version of the "too hard" box in our lives, whether literally or metaphorically?

About a year ago, out of nowhere, I took up puzzling. Perhaps it is simply a sign that middle age has arrived in full force, despite my best efforts to pretend otherwise. But I like to think it is something more. Puzzling is a strange contradiction: it is both addictive and therapeutic. There is a visceral sense of accomplishment when a piece clicks into place, and something in the methodical sorting of edges and colors appeals to a deep-seated desire to bring order out of chaos.

I had somewhat of a startling, though not surprising, revelation the other day. I realized that I have spent much of my life avoiding the situations that would actually help me gain a "deep seat."

A deep seat is a term used in horseback riding to mean a balanced, centered, grounded connection between horse and rider. This deep seat means the rider is not as easily thrown off balance, but also that the rider has a clearer communication with the horse. A deep seat is something to be sought and also practiced. 

A deep seat, I think, also applies to life.

When the world feels chaotic, it is easy to feel that chaos within yourself as well.

It is as if you are being tossed about in a spin cycle, unable to find solid ground. Like a game of whack-a-mole, you are constantly reacting to the next “crisis” or urgent demand, with little time to catch your breath before the next mole pops its head up. This reactive state has become so prevalent in our society that it can almost feel normal.

Except that it isn’t.

A few years ago, I happened upon a post on social media that stopped me in my (virtual) tracks. It was a post by someone I followed referencing life-pondering questions from something called Passion Planner. As one does, I went down the rabbit hole. What I encountered was as life-altering as Alice encountering the looking glass.

But first, I need to back up.

I had a conversation with a friend and colleague a number of years ago that has stayed with me. It’s interesting how, in the midst of the thousands of daily exchanges we have, certain words seem to take root.

My friend, who is Japanese American, was sharing his experience navigating the intersection of his two cultures. He explained that in Japanese etiquette, it is customary—even expected—that when you are dining with others you do not pour your own tea. To do so can be seen as rude, pushy, or overly forward. The "proper" way to move through a meal is to wait for someone else to notice your empty cup and fill it for you.

About a decade ago, a neighbor was rallying our community to help with a massive trash clean-up at the beach. In those days, there were no trash cans on the sand, and over the busy week of Semana Santa, the thousands of visitors left behind a wake that was, quite frankly, ugly.

(I should note that in the decade since, the situation has improved exponentially. The government now empties bins, local vendors do weekly sweeps, and the shoreline is nothing like it once was.)

In fact, the situation has changed so dramatically that I might have forgotten it entirely, if not for a comment another neighbor made at the time: “This is the trash you see—but what about the trash you don’t see?”

There is a specific something, like a frequency or an energy, that I seem to find only when I have been gone and finally return home. It doesn’t happen every time, but lately, I find it happening more and more.

It is like the sensation of stagnant water beginning to move. It is a sense of new life flowing—a sudden, sharp awareness of possibility.

For some time, I have been pondering the idea of "soft eyes." I first came upon the concept in the world of horsemanship, via Sally Swift’s Centered Riding. When I first encountered the idea nearly a decade ago, I thought it was simply a technique for riding. But, as with most lessons found around horses, it turns out it is actually about life as well. 

What are soft eyes? I have come to think of them as a way of being rather than a task to perform.

I am sitting here with a desire to write, but I find that I am not sure what to write.

I love the practice of my daily writing. The connection. That specific feeling of tapping into something that is both deeper and more expansive than my own self. It doesn't feel like "thinking it up." It feels like something is desiring to be made known through me, and I am just the one sitting at the keyboard.

And, really, it has become a sacred time, this morning writing. Not an obligation. Not a checkbox on a list. It’s a treat. A delight. It’s the thing I miss when the world gets too loud or the schedule gets too tight.

But I wonder—why?

Nearly a decade ago, I listened to a podcast by Rob Bell titled “We Are the Committee.” In it, he referenced a scene from the film Chariots of Fire where a decision had to be made about whether the runner Eric Liddell could compete on the Sabbath. There was a flurry of discussion, followed by the familiar, stalling suggestion: This is something for the committee.

One of the members looked up and responded simply: “We are the committee.”

I’ve been thinking lately about safety, about being safe. And I wonder if we don’t have a habit of confusing survival with living? It’s as though we think that if the body is intact, the being is secure. The problem is, we often build our own prisons and call them "security," not realizing that a life without risk is often a life without breath.

A few years ago, I came across an essay by one of my ‘horse people’—a loose term I use for the amazing humans I follow because of their connection with horses, but who offer far more than just ‘horse sense’ to the world. The author was Kelly Wendorf, and the essay was titled “The Surprising Antidote to Your Exhaustion.” At the time, we were deep into the pandemic—in those long, slogging, "will-this-ever-end" stages. I found myself personally mired in an extended period of exhaustion as well, so the title felt like a life raft in a storm. What I read both surprised and intrigued me.

I’ve been thinking lately about the gift of a good editor. At first glance, that might sound like a dusty, academic idea—something associated with musty bookshelves in a forgotten corner of a library. Old-fashioned. Analog.

But let me explain.

Often, books on writing advise us to leave the "editor" behind while we create. They say it is impossible to be the creator when an editor is sitting there kibitzing while you work. The theory is that the editor gets in the way of the creator—that the creator functions from the right side of the brain while the editor looms over the left.

It’s been raining. The power is out, which means the internet is out. 

Without the digital noise, a question emerges: Do I have the same excitement about writing if I feel like I’m doing it entirely on my own? If I don’t have my editor by my side?

That is the thing, isn’t it? Each morning when I sit down to write, I don’t feel alone. I feel like I have a companion—but more than that, I feel like I have a champion. Someone cheering me on, coming alongside me.

Saturday was the annual Cabalgata de la Amistad (Friendship) in La Misión. It falls every February on the Saturday closest to Valentine’s Day; this year, it landed exactly on the day of hearts.

I remember when I first moved to Baja, long before Luna entered my life and before I could truly call myself a horsewoman. I was just beginning to navigate the local horse culture when I first heard the word cabalgata. I remember butchering the spelling, trying to sound it out—it wasn't a word I’d ever encountered in a Spanish textbook.

One day I woke up with a feeling like I had finally returned to myself. That’s odd, I thought. I didn’t know I had gone missing. For a long time, I didn’t realize I was living most of my life "outside" of my body—jumping up and out, running off ahead to scout the territory, worrying, planning, and anticipating. I thought that flighty, upward-and-outward sense of always heading out to scout the territory of the future was just who I was. I thought it was normal. Until I realized it wasn’t.

They say that what you focus on grows. Or, put another way: where your heart is, there your treasure will be. We are often told to invest in what we want to see flourish—to "put our money where our mouth is."

I remember learning this first as a consumer—the idea that how we spend can be a conscious act of doing good. We choose Company A over Company B because we believe in their values. Later, I learned this applied to investing, too; we don't just consume what we want to see in the world, we invest in it to provide the capital for it to grow.

But lately, I’ve been thinking about this on a much more "local" level.