Happy Easter to those of you who celebrate it and to those of you who don’t, I hope you’re enjoying the first day of spring.  We’ve had the most bizarre week of snow; like we’ve never seen before so although we did go out looking for Easter eggs…we had to peel them out of the ice and snow!

I’ve just spent a beautiful couple of hours walking around the welsh hills, amidst snow drifts and sheep tracks in stunning bright sunshine. I was walking with Michelle. I’ve never met Michelle before but we had loads to talk about because we live 6 miles from each other and know a lot of the same people, and coincidentally, we are both course leaders at Kalikalos.

It was only as I was sitting watching my children have their swimming lessons that a cool looking woman said ‘how are your courses going in Greece’ and so the link was made – I just love with when those synchronicities happen.

Michelle is leading walks around the Pelion during September and so for our first meeting we walked around the hills near us.  The sky was clear, the snow dazzling and the company great and as we talked we shared and listened to our dreams.  Michelle talked about how she just loved to walk, how it’s what she’s always done, how it makes her soul sing and her skin tingle and how, it’s taken her to her 40’s to realize that she could do this as a central part of her life, not just as something to be squeezed in around everything else.

I talked about how I’ve always loved learning and teaching, about the years of therapy and workshops I’ve attended and given and how it also took me until my 40s to realize that this was at the heart of me and not just whim or whimsy.

Last week I was teaching a group of adults about Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs when we got to talking about self-actualisation, which is when we’re really being all that we can be, when we’re giving the best of ourselves to the world. The students struggled; they hadn’t really thought about what they had to bring to the world, what their life purpose was or what gave their life meaning.

‘Did you think about it at our age? asked one young woman. And once I’d got over the shock of yet again accepting that I am no longer a ‘young woman’ I reflected that no, I hadn’t.  My twenties and thirties were spent, getting a career, having relationships, traveling, buying houses, cars, stuff and then eventually having children and it was only after I’d ticked off all those ‘to do’ things, that I realized that they were not ‘it’.

‘It’ is not something I have to do as an ‘extra’, it’s not another tick, ‘it’ is just an expression of who I am, of who I’ve always been.  I’ve always been a reader, I’ve always loved learning with and from other people. I do reflect, I am interested in psychology, spirit, soul, people and community. I do like to share what I know to make a positive difference to people’s lives.  All of this is not something I have to ‘try’ to do, it is just what I am, what I bring to the world.  So it is no coincidence that my Love Being Me week includes all of these aspects of me that I can share with you.

Michelle has always walked, alone and with people, not to name and label the trees and flowers she sees, just for the pleasure of walking, and connecting with the world and the people who walk with her. In offering a week of hiking in Greece, she is bringing herself  to the world so that she can be more of herself and so that others can join her in the pleasure of walking too.

  • What is it that you have always loved doing?
  • What have you always done even when you didn’t pay attention to the fact you were doing it?
  • How can you share it with the world so you can do more of what you love and so you can share what you have with other people to bring them pleasure?

Doing what you love, with people who love it too…how much better can it get!  I look forward to a year full of walks with Michelle in Wales and maybe we’ll both see you in Greece.

Love

Julie

 

 

 

If you enjoyed reading this please share it with friends. You might also be interested in talking to me about coaching , or maybe try some of my online courses (some are free), or treat yourself to a climate protecting pamper with vegan friendly, organic Tropic which supports the planting of forests and education in deprived areas.
Thanks for being here.
Julie