lavaland

Slow demise of my sanity…?

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Originally uploaded by Lava.

Being here has enlightened me in ways I did not expect… in my 3 and a half weeks here I’ve evaluated and reevaluated my morals, my self worth, my fundamentals, my beliefs, my breaking points, my work ethic, what I want, what I need… and the list goes on with every corner I turn.

I’ve just been blessed, after what I thought was the most mind numbing 2 weeks of my life with some actual stimulation of the soul by a few unexpected beings.

Now don’t get me wrong, I am exuberantly grateful for the people in my life, but sometimes you need something different to jolt you into realizing you are on the right path (or not). To share, and have people share their experiences worldly or not is an astounding feeling.

There is nothing more that I enjoy than seeing people experience and react to something new in their lives.

Well, maybe I should preface that with there is nothing more that I enjoy than experiencing and reacting myself to something new in my life than….

So things that I have observed:
We will all react differently.
There is nothing wrong with that.
We will all take away the most of the situation. hopefully.
We will mostly all learn from it.

Ha, in writing that and truly reflecting I’ve realized that I could be wrong and strangely optimistic….else I wouldn’t be having a mini breakdown in posted picture.

Perhaps what I have learned is that we will definitely all react differently and the good will come to good conclusions.

Like: The “world we live in” is not the whole world. We will not truly be able to experience the “other side” of life.. and I’m not talking a north american rags to riches story but being able to submerge yourself deeply into another culture and not bring judgment to the situation. For instance, I can’t go to the mall here and head to the bathroom without truly cringing at the fact that there are no toilet seats or toilet tissues…. without quietly judging when others don’t wash their hands on the way out. I’ve been trained that way, they’ve been trained that way… we can’t help it. The difficultly is realizing that neither is wrong, that if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it actually works in society. I can’t expect to come here and preach about how toilets need to have what I’m used to as I wouldn’t expect them to come to north america and preach about what is common in their culture.

I can’t expect them to speak or understand english in my country as well as I can’t expect them to speak or understand english when I am in their country. I would hope they would try to learn some english when visiting north america, as I would hope to have learned some filipino, spanish or french when visiting theirs… if not, we can teach each other.

Building on that… we all have so much to learn and it doesn’t start or end with the way we communicate with each other. It’s too about embracing each others differences. What I’ve learned the most from being here is how to simplify, and how to slow down, be polite, let someone cut you off, appreciate one another. Don’t flaunt or showboat, be humble. Don’t expect the same if you are not with the same. Chill out and enjoy the beach and how beautiful it all is, and how beautiful we all are in our differences.

Emotionally this is the best trip I’ve taken, I’ve learned so much from common misconceptions and different perceptions. I’ve rolled my eyes a few times, I’ve commented on a few things and I’ve been put in my place. But none of it is wrong if we can learn from it in the end. Take away a little more than we came with.

Ultimately, I’ve just reiterated in my life the golden rule…. treat each other the way we want to be treated, because we all deserve that.