03 Feb An Epic Hike and a 2 by 4 moment in Bali
The next few days were low key, chill-n-rest down time at the villas until Jon, Peter, Justin and I ventured out for an off the beaten path hike where few go, where few can even find the path hardly distinguishable among the dense over grown plantation.
What we couldn’t anticipate, what made our leisurely little hike truly KRAZY was the decision by the rain engineers upstairs to crank the sky hose lever into “full throttle” over our designated valley gorge. Just as our car pulled up to the barely visible trailhead the prickly nips of rain on the car evolved into dollops and plops and then a full on shower from the heavens. Within a hundred yards of entering Jurassic Park we were absolutely drenched, sloshing through the vegetation, barely able to make out the almost non-existent trail, 12 inches wide at best, that led deeper and deeper into the Indonesian wild. Our little tribe was tight and focused and out of seemingly nowhere, Jon cut off to the left and we were gone, almost to the point of needing machetes to keep progressing through the dense foliage growing in real time beneath our waterlogged sneakers.
Peter lost his shoe, Justin and I lost our footing and then somehow, after slipping and sliding, breakdancing without breaking ourselves we found ourselves face to face with the rushing waters of a beautiful and fierce waterfall that we naturally had to climb up…on all fours. We conquered that son of a BiT*h! The best part was seeing Jon’s son Justin, the youngest of the jungle Jedi hikers, not even into double digits in age, and right with us every drenched step of that hike. Now that was EPIC!
The first 2 by 4 moment. Couple of friends and I were having dinner overlooking the Indian Ocean and in a heightened state of engagement (meaning several rounds of crazy Bali-tinis and billiards induced cocktails we started going down a path into our life’s’ purpose- what we were doing with our lives, what we were truly gifted at and what we were focused on. The conversation spilled over into the streets after our seaside dinner while we chatted frogger style down the road dodging endless motorbikes and swerving cars around hairpin turns until we found the ultimate big screen sports bar to continue the intellectual pounding.
Intent on not letting the trigger event moment slip away, I pushed hard on my friend with the question of whether the what, how and why of his life were lining up until he whipped out his own 2×4 and bashed himself in the head into a state of “duh, I get it.” The struggles he’d been going through, seeking clarity were the same day after day and week after week for months if not years. But the problem was his mind was the same and his environment was the same. Same patterns, same construct and flavors around him keeping him in a loop of frustration. After months of the same conversation it took one week in a foreign island surrounded by geckos, typhoons and eastern hemisphere sunsets to crack open a space into his minds pattern of thoughts- the BAM moment where he became aware of what he already knew.
The lesson for all of us with his awakening is that sometimes we trap ourselves in our own worldly routines and environments, reinforcing our limiting beliefs and maintaining a protected survival system to keep us going and alive but also keeping us stuck in perpetual mediocrity. We struggle with endless goal writing, therapy, mantras, seminars and coaching and yet we are often right back into our perpetual loop of frustration and status quo.
The break in the loop for anyone can be as simple as going to the airport and taking our mind and body to a foreign and sometimes slightly uncomfortable environment. Foreign in things, people, colors, flavors, smells and perspective.
The simple act (action creates emotion creates awareness creates shifting into truth) of displacement may be the simplest and most direct way to open your mind to true purpose that your daily routine and “life” forbids you to see.
Perhaps the only thing you really have to do to “see” it is to Extract yourself from your “normal” and take a look at life using a vantage point other then the one you’ve used for days, weeks and years, the point of view that’s quite possibly keeping you in a trance and stuck.
Perhaps the feelings and experience of “knowing” the path is simply about going into the forest and slashing out your own path. Cutting into your own path makes it yours and then maybe, just maybe the bliss we crave will naturally form around the forward motion and courage it takes to step outside the normalcy of day-to-day routines.
Naturally I whipped out my own 2 by 4 within a couple days during our final supper. Not that supper. This was the Butcher Gala, Balinese deliciousness with our friends topped off with Jade’s homemade chocolate lava cake that I decided to smother with Jif Peanut Butter. Yum…
Midway through dinner, out of seemingly nowhere, without flinching I announced to the table I’d decided to sell the rest of my “stuff,” my car, the furniture even my toaster and start fresh, with a total reinvention reincarnation of my life as I knew it. The point of the obliteration or liquidation of my stuff was two things. First, it after living free of the stuff I had strapped to my soul back in Texas I totally got it, realizing the freedom conjured up by getting super light and giving up on the illusion of all the supposed security from the silly stuff. Letting go of all that security netting instantly makes me super light on my feet with very little that I have to drag around in moving trucks or shipping boxes.
Second, it creates additional cash that I can use for my Runway (chapter 7 in “Reinvented Life”) to explore a new purpose driven, consciously created life. Within hours of making the decision I sent a message to my assistant in Austin and directed her to initiate operation D-Reinvention-Liquidation. Moments later I collapsed into a deep sleep, dreaming of my life vision unfolding.