I have never being the detailed life planner type but, three months ago, I thought I had everything on schedule to embark on a new adventure. You see, from time to time, we all need to turn the wheels and add some extra spice to our daily routine. I decided to resign to my too old in my calendar job, one that was literally consuming me and surrounding my whole self with a huge bundle of negativity. I packed my suitcases to fly to the other side of the world, where a land of mystery would be opening her arms to me. I closed my ears to the complains and weird looks around me. After all, I have been used to them for most part of my life from those who have considered some of my decisions too risky. I was totally prepared to jump and start all over again as I had done so many times. It has been three months since.
Sometimes, when we think we have everything under control, life itself turns back and unchain a series of events just to confirm to us that we are not in control , she is. An endless bureaucracy got in between the foreign land and my wish to land on it. While waiting for that stamped passport, I forgot that instead of fifteen, there were sixteen steps in the house, which caused a truly ridiculous fall and two broken bones on my left foot. As a result, I met my two new, cold, and stoic companions, a pair of crutches that would greatly limit my movement and activities. Towards the end of my recovery, after getting rid of my two friends, but still carrying a heavy air boot, the cold weather entered the house pipes, freezing them, and causing a heavy interior rain, resulting in a semi destroyed lower level and a forced remodeling project.
Towards the end of the year, an outsider would look at this picture like a series of awful events, a bad luck stage. I figure, some people would look and only see the now unemployed teacher, with a broken foot, a dwelling in ruins, and an uncertain immediate future. Ii is unknown to them that this alleged uncertainty has been the miracle of it all.
I had to leave the place I had inhabited for the last ten years of my life. There is a time for everything and cycles are meant to begin and end. If we stay in a place we don’t feel in our senses anymore because of fear, the day comes when every minute spent there turns into a miserable, digging our own hole event. We wake up in a bad mood, and go though the day complaining and hoping time goes by as fast as possible just to run outside those walls that imprison our soul.
My broken foot was the only way I could sit still, the only way I would have to surrender to my thoughts, my true self, and my inner feelings. From my bed, I was learning a different kind of lesson. I stopped being the teacher to become a student. Now, it was about me and the silence and stillness of both, my mind and body and eventually, spirit landed. The rollercoaster of my life had come to a halt and, after the first week when I was still trying to fight it, I slowly began to enjoy the solitude and deep conversations with my inner little voice. I was actually paying undivided attention, listening to my senses. I could finally see beyond and read the hidden messages; messages of forgiveness, letting go, re-invention and renewal. Maybe, for the first time in my life, I was allowing life to consciously guide me.
At the verge of a new year, I have attained an internal peace, completely unknown to me; totally opposed to the woman I have been. I am still unemployed but now I know what I really want and my faith has grown stronger than ever. I stopped getting upset at those things I can’t control, for I have learned that there is a divine plan for everything in our lives and the worst scenario could be and is, in most cases, a blessing in disguise. I needed time for me, for my family, to get grounded and balanced, to forgive myself and others, to heal inward, and let go of all the people, feelings and thoughts that were not serving my highest purpose,
Yes, I have enjoyed the exciting ride that the rollercoaster of my life has been. I have tasted every moment. This is another kind of ride; the ride to the real me, all of me, the one I had forgotten; the ride towards happiness and gratefulness for the endless bureaucracy, the metal crutches, the flooded house, and the road that led back to my true self. Happiness is indeed a choice and I am ready now to jump in and begin riding again.
Norma Casas was born in San Juan, Puerto Rico and currently lives in the state of Georgia. He has been a high school and college foreign language teacher for over nineteen years. Over the years, she has been studying Methaphysics and is currently studying Numerology and Neuro-Linguistics Programming.