Redefining freedom

December snow on Vancouver Island! Here's me loving up an arbutus in the Sooke Hills

I wonder just how many times I have written on this blog on the theme of transition. 

Here we go again. 

It's December, and it was the first morning, since I moved here to Victoria last January, that I saw the lush green grass in my yard, and the moss and ferns on my running route through Gary Oak ecosystems, completely wrapped in a wet soggy blanket of frozen water, that had arrived over the course of the night time. Snow! Snow in Victoria! It can happen.  

And it's another sign, another symbol, that time is passing. The season is advancing, days getting shorter, crises arising, world consciousness shifting, and life transitions continue...

I'm about to turn 30. 

Over the past months, I've reflected about this passing into a different decade. There are a couple remarkable things that I recognize about what has come and past, and what is present, and ultimately, how the future could unfold. 

My twenties have been so fantastic. These past ten identity shaping years have been full of many things that have prompted a whole heap of growth. I completed a university degree, cycled my heart out in so many places. Experienced transformation in a mobile sustainable community, and worked Toronto for 'the man'. I ran away to ride bicycles, and work on many farms. The adventures continued in Ottawa, Australia, Asia, Latin America. My heart opened to intimate connection, and to the spirit world. I practiced yoga, I played, I experimented, I chanted. In my twenties, I lived.  

Arriving here in Victoria, nearly one year ago, when I was freshly 29, and also living my 30th year, I was so ready. I was ready to choose a place, and to develop a sense of place. When I landed here, on this island, this place in the world, that feels so much like my home place, I landed hard. So, while the transition into my thirties officially happens on the 16th of this month, the transition is fully under way. This past year, I've felt more at home and satisfied with steady, meaningful work, with a garden to steward, and a consistent home to unravel myself in. Having created the fertile ground for partnership during my twenties, I was amazed to notice that (unlike ever before) I began actively inviting in partnership. These patterns of satisfaction, of actually being able to envision myself in a place for longer then a year (I still can't believe that shift as I type it) was totally out of the realm of possibility throughout my twenties. Live somewhere longer then a year? AHH! No way!! In my passionate, adventuresome, independent, curious, energetic, Sagitarian way, I needed to know my next move, where I was going next, when the end date was of the current adventure I was on. My twenties have been a wild ride. Full of such awe inspiration, such interesting experiences in far off places, such dark nights of the soul, such euphoric nature inspired ecstasy...

And through all that movement, I believe that unconsciously, my ability to be grateful for the present moment grew. Which brings me to these past months. In my 3oth year, I feel great about being in one home. I feel great about exploring and adventuring on this island, discovering all the nooks and crannies that this wild place has on offer for me to gently frolic through. All the depth and possibility that these people here in Victoria have for community connection.  I feel enthusiastic about developing my own sense of place in this new home. I feel called to be present. I'm calling in community, I'm calling in nourishment, love, and flow, all here, in one place. Victoria, British Columbia. 

Throughout my adventures these past years, a learning I continually felt naturally arising is that of gratitude. I've learned to be grateful when I was stranded with a mega bike problem at the side of a busy highway in Northern California, the dark creeping in, soaked to the bone and praying I would be warm again.  When my father helped me time and time again to move my things, my bicycles, to deliver me to bus stations, airports. When I sat, surrounded by steady voices chanting Taize, in a yoga sanctuary set in lush tropical gardens in Southern Ecuador, tears streaming down my face. As I continue to see the world, in all it's glory and it's utter and complete misery for so many people, I turn to gratitude, with a fair amount of trust and activism...  I learned gratitude and still experience it when I reflect on all the people who have shaped me during these past ten formative years. My people in Ottawa, my people in Toronto. My people in Waterloo, in Australia, in Mildmay. My people in Montreal and in Vilcabamba, my people in Cambodia. My people in Halifax, and in Kitchener. My people dotted all over the world. My people in British Columbia. Beloveds, lovers, chosen family, friends, partners, mothers, fathers. Relatives, relations, ancestors. I love you. 

Relationships to people, to places, to the nature, to spirit; deep relationships, long lasting relations, short intimate ones, relationships that are every evolving and growing...some have been difficult, some so sweet. They have been so nourishing, supportive and energy gifting..

Thank you, yes you. You who has contributed to the woman I'm feeling happy to be, as I ready myself, so ripe with fullness and energy, to burst through into my thirties. 

There's been one more thing that I have been extremely grateful for during my past ten years: Freedom.

A privilege I acknowledge has been offered to me largely by the system in which I play a part, perhaps at the cost of someone else's freedom...it has been my greatest treasure in my twenties. I didn't originally associate freedom with a fixed address and stable work, but I'm now exploring how freedom can take a variety of forms. In my thirties, I'm redefining what it means to be free. 

Here we go!