Might be driving illegally…?

March 21, 2017March 20, 2017 | Mairead

(New shoots)

I hope you had a lovely St.Patrick’s Weekend! I made a green shamrock to celebrate but it looks more like a green ace of clubs… and I had a very trying experience purchasing an electronic toll card online. It’s a long and winding story… Like at home there are toll booths and there are free-flowing electronic tolls that read your licence number here in Portugal. When we arrived in February at the town of Chaves we stopped at their electronic toll setup machine for foreigners. There we connected our credit card to our camper van number plate and off we went with our legal receipt. Simple. Easy.

(New family)

Then on Saturday morning something woke me up early and made me look at the receipt. It was about to expire. It has expired today. No problem, there was a phone number at the bottom of the receipt, I’d ring and extend the validity date. I could handle this. I rang the number and the man who answered spoke perfect English. Perfect enough to make it clear that I could not extend the validity date. But… I could purchase a toll card at the post office on Monday or online anytime.

(Old day)

Rather than wait until Monday (mistake number one) I went online to purchase the card (mistake number two). There was a very helpful site with Frequently Asked Questions and both the questions and the answers were very helpfully in English. Unfortunately, when I clicked on BUY the card I was linked to the Portuguese Post Office website. I love the Portuguese Post Office. They have patiently sold me stamps and envelopes and delivered (in super quick time) my letters and cards. Nevertheless, I do not like their website. It’s in Portuguese (naturally) and no matter how much I want to believe I could possibly recognise some words I cannot actually recognise any words…

(Old door)

But you will remember Google Translate? The app on my phone that will translate typed words into English? I was working on this problem for an hour by now and although I was losing the will to live I kept going and eventually I bought the card! Yay! And I successfully connected the card to our licence plate! Yay! Then I proceeded to connect the card to my phone so that I could check the balance and keep it topped up and completely legal while we drove in Portugal.

(Old cobblestones)

That’s when the post office website changed the language to Spanish… Google translate was giving me some odd translations about monsters and caves. That was my first hint something bad was happening (I thought I was just losing my mind.) And yet I kept going turning the language back to Portuguese while wishing their English language button would suddenly come to life (but no…)

(Old sign)

I never did get to connect the online card to my phone.. we might possibly be driving around illegally. On top of that there was a message – in English – on the card: PLACE IT VISIBLY ON (VEHICLE’S) DASHBOARD…. We may have to put the laptop in the windscreen for the rest of our stay in Portugal… somebody forgot to bring the power cord for the printer so we can’t print the card.

Step 13. Always wait until Monday, Mairead.

Broken Shells Calling

March 16, 2017March 15, 2017 | Mairead

(Friday evening in Furadouro)

I mentioned yesterday that I loved the town of Furadouro and one of the reasons was the beach. Not the sand but the shells. Not the perfectly pretty and complete shells. The broken ones. I had started noticing broken shells on the beach at Vila Chã, I thought they were interesting but not as interesting as the terracotta coloured stones. Then at Lavos Praia there were no terracotta stones but loads and loads of little broken shells.

(A mix of broken shells and pebbles)

They weren’t everywhere, they seemed to be washed up in a line parallel to the tide line… a broken shell line, but there were so many I couldn’t but notice them. I started picking them up and once I started it was hard to stop, it was like they were calling me. Why would they be calling me?

(Some of the bigger shells I saved!)

The ones in Furadouro were bigger, the chipping away had only begun, but in time (unless I saved them?) they would be tiny little broken bits. I wonder if shells start off perfectly pretty and complete somewhere up north and they get little pieces chipped off as they travel south, until they are so small they look like sand. I saved a bag full from Furadouro. I think I know why they were calling me…

(and more…)

When I picked up the first broken shell I was surprised it was so smooth at the broken edge. It was like it had been sanded with sandpaper. Of course it had been sanded with the original sandpaper… sand. That’s why I kept picking them up. They were lovely to hold and to run my finger along the smooth edge. And they reminded me of buttons. I love buttons. But it wasn’t just their button-like feel, I also recognised a human-like feel.

(…more.)

We start off perfectly pretty and complete and then bits get chipped off and we’re broken. We feel broken. We chip off others. We break others. Everyone we know is broken in some way. But these shells were asking me… Can’t you see how different we are? How very interesting we are? How we are so, so beautiful in our brokenness? I’m bringing a bag of broken beautiful shells home, please let me know if you’d like one to remind you that you are beautiful.

Step 12. Believe it, you are so, so beautiful, Mairead.

Sometimes it rains in Portugal…

February 27, 2017 | Mairead

It’s raining! I know you will be disappointed for me but I’m ok, I have some work to do so it’s probably just as well I won’t be able to sit outside sunning myself… I hear it’s sunny in Ireland!

(Rocky and a bit cloudy in the distance on Saturday)

My friend Linda (of the tours around Porto) and I ran a workshop called MindCraft at the beginning of February and we’ll be running another one in May and again in June. This week I’m working on explaining what it’s all about for our website. I’ll send you a link as soon as it’s up and running but I thought I could start explaining now to get my thought processes working.

(Smooth and blue skies on Friday)

MindCraft is a combination of Mindfulness and Crafting in a one day workshop. The Mindfulness part of it is all about staying present with what’s happening around you and within your body instead of the usual things we do. The usual things like thinking and worrying about the future or thinking and worrying about the past. Or regretting the past or wishing we could repeat it or change it. Or wishing the present could be different. Or wishing we were different. Or wishing other people were different. We sure do a lot of useless thinking when all we really need to do is stay present and aware and deal with what’s right in front of us, right now.

(There are lots of small gardens like this around here, all dug by hand. In need of rain, I suppose)

Last year when Denis was diagnosed with prostate cancer, everything slowed down to the essential – what do I need to be doing now? I don’t think it’s the big things that cause worry and anxiety… it’s the thinking about what if the big thing happens. In my experience when the big thing does happen you are kinda too busy dealing with it to be thinking about anything.

(Another one, the small plants look like potatoes, maybe))

Mindfulness is about making us strong enough to deal with whatever life throws at us. So we have a little calm, contentment and the space to think about the important things… love, joy, peace, purpose, relationships, family, connection, community. The crafting is all about creativity and creativity is the route to finding solutions to our challenges. This is important: Thinking and anxiety are not the route to finding solutions to our challenges. Creativity is the route to finding solutions to our challenges, problems, concerns, difficulties, dilemmas, quandaries, troubles, irritants, stumbling blocks, obstacles, the lot! Creative solutions are what it’s all about. Every one of us is creative but not every one of us knows it. MindCraft wants everyone to know they are creative and that they can come up with their own creative solutions.

(And another one, I think there’s spring onions there)

So here I sit doing the work I need to do to make the message clear and simple… Mindfulness Strengthens Your Mind, You Are Creative, Creativity Solves Problems!

(Interesting looking rocks on the beach)

But it’s not enough for me to just make the message clear for myself or others. Writing about mindfulness will not help me to be mindful, thinking about creativity will not help me to come up with creative solutions. So here I sit, also, doing the work of living the message. Everyday I practice mindfulness, I practice noticing what is around me, I practice exchanging worry and anxiety for beauty, I practice exchanging thinking for feeling my feet on the ground, I practice writing and photography and I practice telling myself, this is enough, you are doing enough, you are enough.

(Behind the harbour buildings there are tables where the women sell the newly caught fish. That’s a cat on the fish scales. Fish weighing scales I mean…)

Step 6. Do the work, Mairead.

The Rock of Gibraltar

March 10, 2016March 9, 2016 | Mairead

(At the back… Ruby and The Rock)

We’ve moved. We’ve left our campsite near Lagos and we’ve left lovely Portugal. We’re in search of a little more warmth and off to somewhere sunny in Spain. But on the way we visited Gibraltar. Gibraltar is a very small peninsula jutting out into the Mediterranean Sea, at the south of Spain. It is also a British overseas territory. They have a Union Jack flag and they speak English. And Spanish. It is interesting to hear people weaving their speech between Spanish and English depending on who they are talking to. We were sitting outside having coffee and there was a local couple sitting at the next table. One moment the lady was speaking with a very pronounced English accent in English to a friend passing by and next thing she was speaking what sounded like fluent, flowing Spanish, in a Spanish accent to a different person.

(At the front… Ruby and the marina)

The currency is pound sterling although they also recognise the € (kinda). We arrived in the town of La Lina on the Spanish side of the Gibraltar/Spain border on Saturday evening and stayed in a motorhome car park at the marina for the night. Next day, Sunday, we set off to have a look at this little bit of Britain in the Mediterranean Sea. It was a beautiful sunny day on the Spanish side of the border as we entered passport control. A machine read our passports and then a human read our passports and then we were in Gibraltar. It was sunny there too! Almost immediately we passed their airport and then we got to cross the real, live, working runway! There were no planes at the time… so we stopped, briefly, to take a few pictures.

(On your marks, get set, go!)

(Quick stop for a photo in the middle… Of. A. Runway!)

All the street signs and shop signs and advertising billboards are in English. We were hoping to go to the top of the rock and see the apes, but the cable car was closed (and so was the Marks and Spencer shop – closed on Sundays). No problem we decided we could probably do with a bit of strenuous exercise and began the long, long, sunny day, steep, climb by foot… Problem. Until we saw a bus… It was at that point that we realised the recognising of the € might be a bit tricky.

(Moorish Castle and flag)

The bus driver was very friendly and unfazed by our slowness – we didn’t know the fare and we held up the whole bus searching for change but we scraped together exactly the right amount – €4. The bus was going to Europa Point where there were beautiful view of Africa (no monkeys/apes though). We took loads of pictures and decided to go back down on the next bus. This time we’d be prepared so we went to the little shop to get change for a €20 note as we had nothing smaller and no coins left. Unfortunately, in spite of us being more than willing to buy some chocolate (more than willing) the shop did not have change of our €20. We were in a bit of a bind… I suppose a little more walking might have been possible… We went to wait at the bus stop. A very friendly lady with her husband and two children told us the drivers are used to giving change. No problem so.

(The lighthouse at Europa Point)

Problem. The driver (not the previous friendly one…) didn’t have change. A nice older man offered to give us the change but he thought we had pounds, sadly when he realised it was euro, he rescinded his offer. Do we have to get off? The driver said I’ll wait while you go to the shop. We tried that, they don’t have change. He said, go on so, sit down. We were very flushed taking our seats. The nice lady’s husband, joked, I bet you’re feeling embarrassed now! and all of us in the English-speaking section of the bus laughed. Gibraltar is a very friendly place. No problem so.

(That’s Africa over there!)

Problem. The bus driver didn’t laugh. He changed his mind, give me the note and I’ll go to the shop. Everyone stopped laughing… Denis went up with our €20. The driver hopped out of the bus, over a wall, around the playground and up the path to the shop. The whole bus waited. Someone joked, Tourists! I think he was joking. I was trying to communicate an I’m sorry to the non-English-speaking people but it mustn’t have translated well, because they were looking at us, but not in a loving way.

(We didn’t feed any Macaques… we did see one from the bus but we were a bit busy at the time…)

Next thing the driver is on his way back with change! It must have been some kind of miracle thing where they discovered change in the till… Whatever it was, the bus started and there was just a bit of mumbling… not sure what it was about, probably not about us… probably, I was feeling very flushed again.

For the rest of our day in Gibraltar we used the credit card, Mairead.

P.S. I’m way over my embarrassment budget so I’ll be giving up embarrassing things for a week or two.

Beja: The Promised Land

January 29, 2016January 28, 2016 | Mairead

Mapa

(We got a map, Lar!)

We’ve been in a bit of a wilderness. Still on our journey south, in search of warm air and bright skies. From time to time we find them. Then we can’t find a place to stay… We found both in Beja, a very old town in the Alentejo region of Portugal. That (very big) region stretches between the Atlantic sea and Spain and from above the north-east of Lisbon to the Algarve.

Portugal Mine Village

(Oranges growing by the path in the mine village!)

Being in the wilderness has had some surprising bonuses, but first some surprising downsides… We found a great camper van parking area in Grandola (it’s west of Beja, if you’re plotting our journey, Sally – btw in primary school we used to plot the routes of huge cargo ships travelling the world) within walking distance of a big supermarket (where they sold Kerrygold cheese… we didn’t even know there was such a thing) on one side and a small town on the other. All was well until six am when the truck drivers arrived to start their day. Trucks make a very loud noise when they start up. They were all gone by the time we were having breakfast.

Beja Street

(Street in Beja)

The following night we thought we had the perfect spot, a camper van car park near an old mine museum, closed when we arrived but would be open in the morning. To add to its attractiveness there were two other campers parked when we arrived. It was in the middle of nowhere surrounded by farmland, roads too potholed for big trucks, perfect. Well… it had just got dark when Jimmy (name changed) arrived, I thought he was from one of the other campers but it turned out he was a down on his luck Dutchman needing the train fare to Lisbon… He didn’t like Anchovies but he had some ham and cheese instead.

Beja House Tiles

(Lots of houses have tiles on the outside)

Then we arrived in Beja. I didn’t want to get my hopes up, the reviews of the site were not glowing. But I needn’t have worried. There are toilets with toilet paper and soap and paper towels. There’s electricity. There are no trucks. There is no sign of Jimmy. The main bonus of travelling through the wilderness is that on the other side you are so happy when the basics are covered. The wilderness has lowered our expectations. I was wondering why that was a good thing and I think it’s because our expectations force us to fulfil them. If we don’t fill them then we are dissatisfied….

Even if we already have enough of everything, Mairead.

Portugal: Day 1 Part 3

January 25, 2016January 24, 2016 | Mairead

(Love this! And it’s exactly the right size for the roads)

So…We found a campsite in a forest full of birdsong, the wi-fi wasn’t great, we set off in search of mobile wi-fi, drive on little roads. me I’m nervous, the perfect Phone Shop is closed…Denis has another idea… we drive up and down the steepest roads in the world (might be slight exaggeration.) Eventually we find a place to park and another shop but still no wi-fi sim thingy and as we stand in front of a McDonalds sign Denis has another idea…

(Scary bridge… into Lisboa)

Let me pause here to tell you something I understood at that precise moment… Before we left Greystones one of my friends asked how could I spend so much time with my husband in a small camper van without wanting to kill him. I didn’t have an answer, because sometimes he is very annoying and I am often very annoyed with him and I think of ways I could hurt him (just kidding… kinda). I mean if it were up to me we would never have left the bird filled glade. I would be smelling lovely after my shower and I might even have a book in my hand. But funny thing, he doesn’t stay very annoying for long and on some occasions, like that moment as we were looking at the “lying” McDonalds-one-minute-away sign and thinking about the long list of things that went wrong today, he’s not fazed he’s still coming up with new ideas and I think… I’d like to be like that, maybe he’s not so bad…

(Sure it is, right here… Seen in Lisboa)

His idea didn’t work but weirdly it didn’t matter anymore. His idea? The lovely assistant at the last shop had said there was another shop, at the train station, they would definitely have the wi-fi sim thingy. We thanked her but having experience of the cobbled stoned streets we knew we were never going there. Until Denis has his latest idea… Denis thought the hospital would definitely have a taxi rank. We could easily make the sign of a train to the driver and there would be a taxi rank at the station to return to the hospital (whose name was amazingly easy to remember and pronounce – Padre Americano!)

(We’re finally here!)

With the help of two (very friendly, very helpful) taxi drivers we explained where we wanted to go (yes I said Choo, Choo and made train wheel movements with my hands!) But when we arrived at the train station we couldn’t see any shops. Immediately (seriously, within seconds of arriving!) a man waiting for his train called to us in perfect English “Are you lost?”

(Lisboa during the day)

Let me pause again to say… you might be a little suspicious of a stranger at the train station offering help (no? just me then…) but remember, all day long we experienced very friendly, very helpful strangers in this strange land. So I choose trust instead of fear and said, yes we are lost. He directed us to the Phone Shop. Of course he did.

(Lisboa at night)

Inside a very friendly, very helpful assistant (I am not kidding, she went out of her way to help us, to apologise for her English and to tell us about another shop) gave us the bad news… although she did indeed have the particular sim, in fact three of them, they were all out of date and she couldn’t reactivate them. We thanked her (in Portuguese, our pronunciation getting better with all the practice we get to thank people here!) and left to get our taxi to the Padre Americano hospital.

(Table for two at a balcony in Belém, Lisboa)

Ok that was it, Denis was all out of ideas, we’d failed again but we were surprisingly upbeat…. there really was nothing more we could do, we’d done our best and now it was time to stop. Back at the car park in warm and cosy Ruby we broke open a bottle of Spanish wine and had tinned salmon sandwiches (one slice of bread each, almost carbohydrate-free) for dinner. We could start again in the morning but for now it was time to sleep.

(Can you see that red bridge in the background? That’s how we left Lisboa… do these people have no fear?)

The next day was different. Travelling by big wide motorway we arrived in Lisbon (called Lisboa) after lunch. Our campsite is situated right beside a motorway exit in a big park. There are lots of birds here too. We went into Lisboa on the bus and queued in the mobile phone shop for an hour. They had the mobile wi-fi sim thingy.

We have the internet! But I’m just listening to the birds, Mairead.

Feeling some madness…

October 7, 2015October 6, 2015 | Mairead

(Can you see this kite surfing guy’s feet and surfboard are out of the water?)

It rained a lot last night. Lots of rain, lots of wind. Teeny tiny bit of sleep. Not feeling too bubbly today. So I’m reminded of something Eckhart Tolle wrote “When you complain you make yourself a victim. Leave the situation, change the situation or accept it. All else is madness.” It’s kinda nice to find patterns in the things you see and experience and relate them to the way you feel inside, isn’t it? I think so. I think it helps to understand the feelings inside.

(This boat was just sitting on the beach this morning… could someone look up French salvage laws, please – we might own a boat)

So, here’s us having a nice old-time wandering around France, minding our own business. Loving the sun and the pleasant temperatures at this time of year. Then, the storms arrive. From nowhere they come…. And one might be tempted to whine and grumble. At home we might say “desperate weather, isn’t it?” to the postman or the assistant in the bank or the next door neighbour.

(More doodling today)

In France I haven’t a clue how to say anything about the weather and when I consider looking it up (or asking Thierry) there’s no incentive to do so. There’s no good that can come out of telling the French people in the camper van next door that it’s raining… They already know. Sometimes it rains. Get over it. There’s at least four guys out on the water doing their kite surfing thing. They’re already wet so a bit of rain doesn’t bug them and the wind is very useful when you have a big huge kite.

(Fence post with organic decoration)

So how’s this relate to feelings? Sometimes we feel down, maybe it’s the weather, maybe it’s an insensitive friend, maybe it’s a disappointment – life can be very disappointing. So we talk to ourselves or others with words something like “desperate feeling, I’m having”. Maybe we whine a bit, grumble a bit and complain some. What if we had to translate our complaints into French (or Swahili if you’re fluent in French) would we bother? Like the rain, the feelings will be gone soon and like the wind for the kite surfers, they are useful – they remind us we’re alive!

Sure isn’t it great to be alive? Mairead.

The Many Homes of Rain

September 17, 2015September 17, 2015 | Mairead

(When the rains came we took comfort in liquid brewed by ancient Belgian monks…)

Right so… it’s been a while… there was a storm, with rain and dark clouds, grey skies, the air got colder, it was a bit like winter… so we moved. That’s one of the great things about the camper van – if you don’t like where you are you can move somewhere else! Although sometimes the weather moves with you! Last time I wrote we were in Souillac which is on the Dordogne river. When the rain had fallen for three days in a row we decided to move. We moved west to Limeuil which is at the meeting of Dordogne and the Vézère rivers. It was a beautiful location and a very pretty site. We stayed two days, it rained for two days, we moved…

(Stony beach at campsite in Limeuil)

Yesterday we arrived in Montricoux, it’s further south in the Tarn and Garonne department (according to Wikipedia.) We drove about three hours (slowly on narrower roads than I’m happy to think about) to get here and along the way it was interesting to see the landscape change. Setting out we travelled along dark green tree and hedge lined winding roads – could have been in county Wicklow. Both of us clad in jeans and fleeces after an hour and a half we noticed a warmth and the fleeces were off. Half an hour further down the road the air-conditioning went on. That’s when we noticed the outside scenery had changed. It was flat, or at most gently rising and falling, roads went straight on for miles. Vegetation was sparse of light green or yellow colour. As there were no hedges to block the view we could see flat countryside for miles around. It seemed like this place didn’t get much rain. We were sure we had out-run the weather.

(A bird…)

We found a small campsite and parked in a grove of trees near reception, unpacked the chairs, the table, the clothes line. The washing that had been damp for three days was hung up and off we went for an ice pop. I started cutting and pasting. But by evening I was noticing a familiar scent in the air… rain? Couldn’t be, too warm but just in case I took the washing back in. I did leave my glued paper out… I think it was 3am when I woke to the familiar pitter patter, there was a thunderstorm outside. So, they do get rain here after all.

(I really liked those stones in Limeuil)

When real morning arrived (at 9am) it was dark inside the camper (did I mention I love the blackout blinds?) and I thought, we’ll have to move again… but no, outside it was blue skies and a few little white clouds. The washing is drying, the glue is setting, it’s too hot to go for a walk… maybe an ice pop?

Weather is everywhere… just not rain today. Mairead.

I’m bursting to share this thing…..

October 21, 2013October 20, 2013 | Mairead

2010a

(Lavender)

AAAAAh I was taking to someone over the weekend and they asked me what I was up to and I mentioned my Kickstart you Creativity course was starting in November. And as I mumbled and stuttered through some kind of an explanation I realised I couldn’t talk about it. I can’t talk about this thing I’m bursting to share…. It. Is. So. Frustrating. And of course my fallback for a solution to my inability to talk is to beat myself up. Today, I’m going to do something different for a few minutes, here….

2010b

(Love in the Mist)

Because I know most of you don’t live anywhere near the town on the east coast of Ireland and the west edge of Europe where I am going to run my course it makes it easier for me to tell you. I’ll write to you about my tiny little dream that I’m too afraid to speak about out loud… and I can hide behind my writing. This post is just for me (note to self: is it time to admit that this whole blog is just for you?) I don’t know what I’m going to write. Maybe by the end I’ll have a moment of acceptance or a moment of clarity or just a big meltdown. I do know I will stop at the bottom, post it and tomorrow I will write about something else.

2010c

(Mushrooms… bursting through the soil)

But today it’s about this: I’m bursting to share a thing that brings me peace and calm! But it’s too, too, too precious for me to bring it out into the light. It might get attacked by marauding bands of baddies….. Ok that sounds crazy. I know. I know it sounds crazy, but… Remember when you were little and you got this great present from your favourite uncle/aunt/mother’s best friend/rich shopkeeper? It was so great! And you wanted to show your friends, didn’t you? And you ran out to the green/road/school and you said in your little girl/boy voice “Look at this great thing Uncle John gave me!” And that moment when you stopped speaking was the happiest you were for the rest of the day because kids can be cruel and they didn’t share your enthusiasm or even your interest in your great thing or your wonderful Uncle John.

2010d

(Beauty underneath)

So you learned a clear lesson – keep the best stuff to yourself. Keep the stuff that means the most to you to yourself, hidden from the light in a safe place. Even if it means you can’t use it. Like the tiny china tea set that I got one year out of the blue from a friend of my Dad’s. It was fun sharing it with my dolls but it would have been so much more fun sharing it with my brother and my friends… but I couldn’t trust my best stuff, the things closest to my heart, with them so we all lost out. When I couldn’t share my china tea set no one got to experience how great it was – not even me. I was afraid it was going to break or my heart was going to break because they wouldn’t think it was as amazing as I did!

Aaaaaah and here I am again!

2010e

(Fence in Altamont)

When this thing began it was a tiny dream and a minuscule little thought. I wanted to uncover a process that would allow me to share what I found – peace, calm, and the fun of creation – with others. It grew when I was in France, when I went out to the garden each day and I felt myself connecting to peace as I began the process. And it worked. I started to think I could really do this. I could definitely share this process and maybe it could help other people connect to peace.

2010g

(Moss growing quietly on a rock)

Then I began to have doubts… Would it actually work? Is there a path through creativity to peace and calm in a human’s life? A sometimes difficult, challenging, even awful life? If there is would my little process find it for others? Who would want this, maybe I’m the only one who wants to connect to peace and calm? Now that I think of it, maybe getting basic physical needs met is more important. Needs like food, warmth, health, money….

2010i

(Hydrangea)

But the doubts (even if they are valid) are just a smokescreen… they are hiding my fear and my sadness. And I can’t blame the children who taught me the lesson. I can’t blame their parents. I have no one left to blame but myself… and that isn’t working too good…. so I’m going back to my precious things. The precious things, the china tea set or my course are so connected that I may be able to free one with the help of the other.

2010h

(Butterfly and Lavender)

I don’t need encouragement, I have lots of encouragement, I have to step out on this ledge on my own….

I don’t need anyone to tell me you big eejit just do it! I am telling myself that all the time…. and it isn’t working.

I don’t need anyone to tell me it’s easy…

I don’t need anyone to point out that I have been encouraging others to follow their dream and I can’t even do it myself… I know.

I don’t need encouragement not to do it…… I am bursting out of my skin to do this… and I am scared shirtless.

And that reminds me, I read a quote this morning: Fearlessly accept the reality; then fearlessly set about transforming what needs to change. — Elena Brower.

So while I’m revving up my fearlessness, maybe you could share your precious thing? Mairead.