Do I have time to go sit in a coffee shop? Better to stay in the hotel room and jump rope, meditate and double check my bags. I don’t want to cut it close as I fly to Malaysia. The hippie spiritual parts of me are sad to leave Bali and cautious to step out into the chaotic world. Bali is a safe haven full of gentle warm smiles and I feel at home here now. This airplane is taking me to a foreign country where the laws are strict, my freedom feels she must hide, and on back in the edge of not knowing how I might be offending someone. This is out of the comfort zone. I say this out loud to myself now. “I am outside my comfort zone,” and whatever discomfort minor or grand that I feel in my body softens and trust trickles in.
Am I ridiculous and irresponsible? Maybe. Or maybe my intuition is so fucking powerful I can’t help but obey. My driver is nervous. He is afraid I’ll miss my flight and I feel the nerves in my belly as well. Is this what coffee addiction looks like? I’ll make a driver turn the car around and add twenty or thirty minutes to an already-cutting-it-tight flight so I can place an order at Birama Coffee. It was in my guidebook. I was curious. I needed to eat something before traveling. A croissant or bread will do. A coffee for the drive will be nice. Shit show success. One sad croissant in the cabinet display. No alternative milks. So I took the sad croissant and ordered a simple double espresso and feeling the rush of my driver and seriously nervous I’m about to miss my flight I took some deep breaths and then this woman walked in. “Is there anywhere around here where I can find a coffee and some peace and quiet?!” She was joking and clearly exasperated. As my coffee poured slowly into a papery cup, she poured out her frustration into my ears. She’s travel from Canada to Bali for peace and quiet and has had nothing but noise, chaos and ugliness! How horrible! I remember how overwhelmed and negative I felt arriving in Ubud. I had expectations of spirituality bliss and I found traffic! “Hand me your phone.” I typed into her notes the spots around Ubud were I had found that peace and quiet. Top of the list was Keliki Coffee, Yellow Flower Cafe and Twilight Huts on Nusa Ceningan. I told her to go there before totally giving up hope on Bali. I grabbed my esspreslow coffee and jumped into the GoCar, fingers crossed I’ll make my flight. I comfort myself in believing that this detour may have brought peace to another human and as long as I can keep peace inside myself as I move quickly to the airport, it was worth it. Or maybe I didn’t go to give her peace. Maybe I went to realize how much peace I have.
I pull down my mask and smile at the airport lady holding my passport. My bags slide forward through the xray machine and I reach back to scratch a bug bite on my leg. My hand feels my leg through the cotton fabric of my gray jumpsuit. My leg feels different. The shape is wider, rounded, a little lumpier and softer than I’m used to. Normally, I reach my hand back and feel firm muscle, square shapes and a clear distinction between hamstring and glute. Two months break from daily workouts and my tissues are softening. I see cellulite in the mirror lumps and bumps where smooth clean curves usually are. Scary to realize how much self worth has gotten tangled in my muscles and BMI. My body looks at me and asks, “do you still love me like this?”
My journey is leading me to saying, “yes” and I feel peace knowing I am always changing. I’ve seen myself go through phases. I gained weight in Italy and Hawaii. I lose it easily in Seattle with smoothies, a meal plan and daily lifting. I lost muscle mass in Bali and picked up some fat. I didn’t need the muscle for my Bali activities. I was walking, stretching, meditating, writing and scrolling on my phone. My smart body decided I needed to store up some fat. Food was comforting the lonely parts of me, the parts of me who didn’t know how else to care for myself, the parts of me who felt confused about what diet to eat as my emotions raged and my digestive system exploded. Food is life. Water is life. Air is life. Sleep is life. The routine I crafted in Seattle sculpted my body into a fitness focused machine. Fitness was almost a coping mechanism as I struggled to regulate emotions; the living circumstances were constantly triggering PTSD. My Oura ring reports were a statistic rollercoaster. The stats balanced in Bali. My sleep health has returned! No more nightmares, anxiety, tossing and turning, morning fatigue, confusion of where to sleep each night, depression awaking in the grim city. Sleep health is back! Space to myself and moving at my own pace has brought in emotional stability. I’ve watched my protective manager parts take turns trying to comfort the lonely scared or stressed exiled parts of me. What a show! So predictable and I feel compassion for my parts as they figure out how to live together. With emotions stabilizing and good nights of sleep, I’m excited to step back into balance of fitness and nutrition. How will my body change next? What will I learn to love? What will I learn to change?
“Oh, madamn would like Indian food? This restaurant you go to is not good. Very expensive and not good food. Madamn would like good Indian food. I take you to Little Indian. Give me your phone and I record voice for you. You play for man at food counter and he give you the good Indian food. Little India is much better. You walk around and call me after you eat and I pick you up and take you back to your hotel. Madamn will like this Indian food much better.” — my Grab driver who drives everyday and dreams of sending his three year old daughter to International school one day.
“Where are you from, if I may ask?” “America. Do you know Seattle?”
“I do. And what brings you here?”
“I’m just adventuring.”
His handsome Indian face smiles, “After a long time, ya?”
I smile, “Ya.”
My heart feels warm here with the spices on my tongue. This different world is so familiar. Everywhere I go I never want to live. Through my parents I tasted the world beyond my childhood. Now I understand who they are as I see glimpses of the world that shaped them. Just as my children would be touched by yoga, I have been touched by their time in Southeast Asia. Although I travel here with myself now for the first time, very little is new to me. I feel more at home here than I do in most places in America. I inherited blood that lives to travel, to always be in new places, smiling my way through each day of fresh discovery. What magical new wonder will lift my spirit today? They did this to me. I cannot escape genetics as I grow into my parents and beyond. I feel the expanding human spirit ripping forward in my chest. Heartbroken at the inevitable death we face and alive with the hope that we live for some reason. I don’t know what it is and I can feel it. I feel it when I drop below the surface and feel the web of interconnected life. Life itself wants to live. Life, consciously and unconsciously, lives through us, not just in us but before, during and after us. Life is on a journey forward through time outside of our imagination. Life goes on and on and here we are right in the middle of it. No wonder I tingle with sickness and purpose when I attune to this inescapable reality. I am just life living and as the observer, I sit back and watch it find its way. What else is there to do? It’s tragic and beautiful.
Am I a Tantrika, realizing her role in this world just as one day long ago I realized “I am a yogi.”? I’m getting more specific now. This is indeed how I’ve been living all along. How fun to have a name to call this way I be!
Love & Rainbows, Cha Wilde