Retreat in the Heart of Darjeeling

Maps! Not just any maps. Official Ordnance Survey Ireland maps. Now I have everything I need for the journey, including one white luggage tag for my suitcase that must be under 37 pounds.

I love maps. I love looking at them and imagining what might be along all these lines, green areas, parks, bays, and villages. I can envision what I’ll see walking along 59 miles of these broken red lines.

Being outside and trekking along bluffs and hills will undoubtedly be nourishing for my soul. OK, Soul, get ready! In my opinion, when communing with the Universe, it is best not to set expectations, but just BE.

Last night I was reading The Courage to Grieve by Judy Tatelbaum. She says, “To recover fully from a loss means to finish or completely let go.” We’ve all lost someone or something. Change is exciting, but it’s also a loss of who we were before. Once, when I was eight, I lost my pet baby guppy. My brother’s fish ate it. There was the tail of my baby guppy wiggling outside the bigger fish’s mouth.

Moms are really made of something special. Don’t ask me how, but somehow she got my guppy out of the fish’s mouth and put it in a separate glass of water where it floated for two days before we pronounced it dead and gave it some version of last rites. Sigh. Well, anyway, I think I have had closure on that issue.

So on my walk, I hope to develop a stronger, more fulfilling relationship with my Higher Self…a real friendship with God. Here’s what I read in Finding a Higher Love--A Spiritual Guide to Love, Sex & Relationships by Elizabeth Clare Prophet: “If someone truly loves you for who you are, you know that you can make it. You know that you can go on. You know that you can become the fullness of your true self. And this is the nature of friendship with God and close relationships between souls who are striving.”

Something else wonderful happened today, by some cosmic coincidence. I received a handmade card from someone I had given a copy of my book, Issa–The Greatest Story Never Told. She gave me great encouragement and said, “My relationship with Mary and Jesus has changed. I struggle to find the right words to describe my thoughts and feelings. They are deeper and stronger feelings toward both of them.”  I was awestruck and I know that her kind remarks have nothing to do with me, but with the Holy Spirit and her own relationship to Jesus and Mary. But to learn of this experience makes all the effort worthwhile. I am grateful and humbled.

Last but not least, I want to share a picture of the lake near my dad’s house at sunrise. The walk around the perimeter is two miles and it is one of the ways I keep active here. I guess it’s Menifee Lake, but I call it the Lake of Hope.