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Facing Houselessness
I have been waking up early in the morning with a feeling of dread. It is that familiar feeling that I am not being supported by the Universe; that life is kicking me out. I get up! Make my tea and sit with the feeling until it gives way to other feelings. I log into my computer to write this blog post and see that a past client is reaching out for support. A small sign of abundance. I turn my phone on and my boyfriend is offering to buy my van, Red Raven, now, so that I will have the cash, and I will turn it over to him when I leave. More abundance.
Maybe the Universe is showing me that I am making the right decision. It is supporting me in my new direction. Maybe as I surrender and move in the direction that is unfolding before me, more opportunity and more abundance will come.
My saving grace is to trust in the very thing I feel has abandoned me and let me down. I have to trust that this higher power; this higher force has a plan for my life that I can’t yet understand. This is a redirection. I am being guided into a new life. I don’t know what that life looks like. Sometimes I fear the worst.
My reflections go to the homeless man sitting on the street corner with his sign “anything will help,” and I see him through new eyes. What was his story? How did he get there? Any one passing by might assume it was drugs, or alcohol or some catalyst of his own doing. But what if it was just a series of events so far beyond his control, that he could not break the fall?
In Sedona, it is typical to hear the saying “why did you create this?” With the law of attraction, there is an assumption that everything we experience in our life is a product of our own creation, either consciously or subconsciously. Either we are creating through intention or through default. But this has always been confusing for me. For months on end I would wake up every morning thanking God for my great abundance, even as my life was falling apart. I would still affirm that I was wealthy and had everything I needed. This didn’t prevent my life from falling apart. Some might say I didn’t feel it enough. I didn’t believe it strong enough. But the truth is, I did believe that things were going to turn around for me. I put so much effort into trying to keep my life afloat, believing that my efforts were going to pay off.
This is where the feeling of betrayal comes from. I did everything right! Sure I felt fear and uncertainty. But I also had a lot of hope and faith that things were going to change. So is it possible that life takes everything from us, when it is trying to redirect us? Does the Universe/God, rip our life apart when we are far too comfortable, so we will be forced into the life that is more fully aligned with our purpose?
A friend of mine reminded me “Kaleah, maybe one day you will look back on this time and realize you were taken to a much greater place.” The new can always be much greater than the old. But it can also be worse. Only time will tell.
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Welcome to Sandpoint
I found my way to Sandpoint, Idaho, one of my favorite places in the world, with tall mountains and a very large deep water lake that makes me think more of a Bay than a lake. Some of the best hiking is in this area with tall pine forests and beautiful expansive views of Lake Ponderay. I was hiking between 5.5 and 6 miles a day, sometimes straight up hill.
I’ve lived near Sandpoint for many years and in some ways it is “like home” to me but it also brings up a lot of emotional energy that is coming to the surface to be healed and released. I was very near old memories and wounds and yet I was drawn here for a reason. To heal! Ironically, I have an appointment with my Lyme Disease Doctor while here. He specializes in the alternative diagnosis and treatment of Lyme Disease and was my “miracle doctor” when I was in the worse pain of my life. Now and then I have relapses and he helps me kick the healing back in.A series of events led me to delve a little deeper into my own emotional ups and downs and a deeper understanding of myself. I knew that this trip/journey was a spiritual journey for my own growth and expansion, but I wasn’t sure what I needed to expand in myself. Life seemed to bring a lot of lessons that had me learning how to roll with the punches and accept whatever happens on an external level. But my journey was becoming much less “external” and much more “internal” as the time passed by.
I haven’t had any further issues with my van since leaving Colorado. That was the first phase of my journey where there were a lot of external challenges. Ironically even as I was leaving Colorado, I lost my credit card at a gas station. I was hesitant to report it missing at first, thinking it might show up somewhere in my van, but it never did. I had this card attached to all the auto deductions for my business, and it would be a pain to replace, especially while traveling. Eventually I found my card. It wasn’t in my van. It was with someone who was planning on having a spending spree in Vegas. Fortunately, I get notified by email whenever there is a purchase on my card and I happened to be Online when the notification came in, so I immediately reported the card stolen and it closed my account down. Another “out there” experience.
The external issues began falling away and in its place the deeper emotional healing was on the table. As I walked miles in nature, everything would just flood to the surface and I experienced a lot of emotional highs and lows. I ended up having a psychic reading from a psychic medium who was visiting the area for a day. One of the first things he told me was that my deceased Father was a powerful guide in my life and traveling right along with me. His was the loudest voice of all my guides as he had an important message for me. The message had to do with some choices I needed to make for my well-being and highest good at this time. Ironically I had already made “the right choice” and my Father’s words were validation that I was listening.The psychic was actually very accurate and described my Father’s appearance and his approximate age, his love for water and even the way he died. My father also wanted me to know that he had a sense of adventure like I do.
Since this phase of my journey took me deeper into loneliness and a feeling of isolation, knowing I had an invisible traveling companion was helpful. The other validation I received in the reading was that this journey was indeed for my spiritual growth and there was a lot of emotional healing happening. There always seems to be a lot of emotional healing on the table. It has been my life path to embrace healing and to facilitate it. I learned long ago that a therapist can only take a client as deep as he/she has gone herself. The more we are able to face our own core wounds and develop the awareness of what lies deep beneath the surface, the more we can “see” the wounds in others and help them to heal.
As I travel around, camping in various campgrounds, I am constantly exposed to families, couples, and groups of friends, and it makes me feel more a lonely wanderer without a tribe. Most of the time, other than my contact with clients, I spend long hours in the world within, listening to the voices in my head and riding the various waves of emotion that stem from complete “awe” of the beauty that surrounds me, to deep sadness connected to my own isolation.
I picture myself as a monk on a mountain, just sitting in solitude for days, weeks, months and facing the inner demons that find fault with my existence. I suppose it is also like the story of Jesus in the desert, confronting Satan. When we spend a lot of time alone and in isolation, the dark forces see an opening, a weakness that it thinks it can exploit. That voice sometimes tries to convince me that my life isn’t worth living; it has no real purpose, and nobody really loves me or cares about me. I am truly alone!Sometimes it is a choice that I find myself alone in the world. I enjoy long periods of reflection and solitude. But sometimes those long periods seem to extend into eternity and I begin to feel I am an alien. I don’t belong here. I’m not like the “others.” There is no place I really fit in. I’m an outcast.
The one thing I have learned in life that is quite profound is….wherever I go, I’m still here. There is no reason to believe this reality will ever change. Whether I am in this physical body or floating somewhere beyond it, I’m still here! I still exist. The healing journey I am on urges me to find a deeper peace within myself and to foster a deeper sense of love and forgiveness for those who have rejected, hurt and betrayed me. Everybody is doing the best they can, with the level of awareness they are in. The more we face our darkness, the more light that surrounds us. Some people are attracted to the light, others fear it because it exposes the darkness within the Self.
In many ways I have felt more invisible on this leg of the journey. I fly under the radar and feel that I am rarely noticed at all. I’ve even noticed the friends who were contacting me on a consistent basis suddenly dropped out. Not just one friend; all of them. It became very quiet on the inside, although I was surrounded by a lot of activity. I spend my time in campgrounds where everyone is chopping wood, carrying water, busy as beavers going about their business of boating, swimming with the kids, barbecuing and taking their day trips. I am but another camper going about my business. And it may also be, that the deeper I go 
into my personal reflection, the less I notice them. I hear the sounds of boats on the water, children laughing and screaming, the pitter patter of feet, air mattresses being inflated, and vehicles coming and going. I smell the coffee, the fire, and the barbecue. I am aware of life going on around me. But I don’t pay much attention to it.In Colorado there was a lot more human connection. I made friends and enjoyed time with people along the way. I had a feeling of being more “visible” and embraced. But it was time to go. I felt it.
When I first arrived in Sandpoint, I took my van to a car-wash to clean the pitch that fell from the pine trees I was camped under in Whitefish. I was busy washing my van, trying to get the pitch off when a large truck with a boat attached pulled up behind me, waiting for me to finish. When I realized that I hadn’t pushed the right button for the soap, I went and flipped the switch and started scrubbing the area’s that had the pitch with the brush, and the man in the truck yelled out at me “Are you going around again?” I was a bit oblivious to his obvious distress that he was going to have to wait a little longer. I explained that I had pitch on my van and was trying to wash it off, it would be a few more minutes. He angrily jumped back in his truck, backed up and screeched out of the car-wash. Welcome to Sandpoint!
Several times I was returning to my Van and putting things away, getting food out, or whatever and someone pulled up behind me asking me “are you leaving?” Innocent question, I know, but when I explained that I would be a while, I often had the same reaction…”I wish she would just leave!” It was an opportunity for me to NOT take on other people’s intensity. Sandpoint is crazy busy in the summer. With that comes a certain amount of traffic, waiting, parking issues and difficulty finding a campsite. I got lucky with the campsite.
Each area that I travel to has different experiences and lessons to learn. Sandpoint has been the most emotionally challenging for me, so far. Perhaps it is the memories attached with this area, or perhaps it is the accumulation of over six weeks on the road living in my minivan; my little sleeping pod on wheels. But I will be leaving soon, over the Mountains to another place, other experiences. I will be visiting friends and family. That will be a nice break in the isolation.
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Smoke Signals
There is something about the feel of the wheels going round and round as everything I’ve just experienced is in my rear view mirror. There is something about the prospect of a new adventure, going places I’ve never been before. There is something about the feel of following the call of “the voice within” that leads me to new destinations and powerful new experiences.I woke up in a Durango campground after spending another Thursday evening enjoying the night life in Durango, which included Thursday concerts in the park. I had driven the long, windy, mountain road from Durango to Silverton in the dark, several times now and didn’t feel I should push my luck. I opted to stay. In the morning the air was thick with smoke from the forest fires. Evidently the firefighters decided to fight fire with fire and had started several small fires to manage the big one. I ran some errands and headed back to Silverton, hoping the air would be clean there. As I descended into Silverton there was a thick layer of smoke, resting on the small community like a heavy fog. That was my smoke signal. That was my sign. It was time to go!
It took about an hour to get my camp in Silverton packed up and I pulled out around 3pm, heading over the big mountain to Ouray and Ridgeway. I found a beautiful campsite at the Ridgeway State Park, just outside of Ridgeway, perched above a large lake. Fourth of July week was upon us and campers were out in full swing. Getting a campspot was a challenge.
There was a sadness in my heart, leaving behind the place I had grown to love so much, and the people I met there, but the signs couldn’t have been any more clear to me. It was time to move on.
My next destination was Carbondale, Glennwood Springs and Aspen, all located in the same area. I had been to these places before and remembered their raw beauty, with jagged mountain peaks stretching up into the sky and lush green valleys down below. In some places there were red rock formations like Sedona, mostly in Redstone and Glennwood Springs. Finding camping was a challenge, but I settled for another commercial campground perched over a river and the freeway. It wasn’t ideal, but it was a safe place to park for the night. I enjoyed a concert at the river park in the evening and a pint of “So Delicious” non dairy ice cream; something I didn’t have very often.
The next morning I packed up camp and headed to Aspen. All camp spots were full for days to come. That was the case in Carbondale and Redstone as well. Aspen was crawling with tourists and bumper to bumper traffic. I didn’t feel to stop and walk around the town. I wasn’t in the mood to shop for overpriced touristy items and I didn’t want anymore coffee. I kept driving back down the mountain to Basalt where they were having a Sunday Market. I ran into my friend Hinton, from Sedona, who I also ran into in Taos, New Mexico. Like me, he was living in his Van, only it was a full time venture for him. We enjoyed reconnecting, catching up and spending a bit of time together before I continued on my journey.Since I had no place to camp, it felt time to continue on down the road. I didn’t want to go to any of the heavier populated area’s in Colorado, so it was time to leave the state and head to my beloved Northwest. I was born in Anacortes, Washington, the Gateway to the San Juan Islands. I had explored much of the Northwest already, but it was still home to me, and I always loved returning. Going from the Southwest to the Northwest was a long drive of several days. Since it was Sunday and I worked on Monday, I would have to stop somewhere to take clients. Fortunately it was a light week, because it was a Holiday, so I cleared the spaces on my Calendar that weren’t yet booked to give me more travel time.
I didn’t pull out until 3pm, once again, and arrived in Brigham City, Utah at nightfall, finding a trusty KOA campground to park for the night. My first client wasn’t until 11:30 Mountain time the next day, so I got an early start and made it to Pocatello, Idaho, got an oil and transmission fluid change, a Starbucks, and settled in at a local park to begin my work day. I had a several hour break in the afternoon as a client failed to show for her appointment, so I drove to Idaho Falls, and settled in at the river park overlooking the falls for my next two clients. I found a Natural Grocers in Idaho Falls to stock up on my favorite traveling foods between sessions, gassed up the car and pulled out after my last session at 7pm. I drove until nightfall and found a free camping area in a small Montana town, about a half hour from Butte, Montana. My destination was Whitefish, Montana for the fourth of July.When I arrived in Whitefish, it was pouring rain. Such a contrast from the dry, tinderbox of Colorado. Whitefish embraced me with one of its few remaining tent sites to park my van. It was a blessing to be welcomed in this way. As the rain poured down, I nestled into Red Raven (my minivan) with my journal, grateful for the warm, dry place I called home.
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Three Weeks on the Road
It has now been three weeks of my four month “Flying Solo” Journey and let me tell you, it feels like it has been three months. So much has happened on so many levels. Friends ask me how I am liking it and if I am ready to go back home yet. The answer is, “I love it” and “no, I’m not ready to go back home.I find myself in the mountains of Colorado, getting to know the people and I even met a man that I am having fun with. In fact, I have met several men. I never meet men in the Sedona area that I resonate with. There is something about the outdoorsy, mountain life that fits me. All I need to do is walk down the street and people will strike up conversations with me.
I went to a “trance dance” on the Summer Solstice and already knew four people there, I had met in the past week, not including the man I went with. I was already beginning to feel a part of the community and the community seems to embrace me.
My desire to “move on” too far out of the area I am in is non-existent. Perhaps one day I will feel differently, but now, I feel “at home” here in the mountains. I am not flying too fast, or too far, nor am I going at it completely alone.We all need to make peace with ourselves and find that “self-love” that allows our inner light to shine brightly. Our “inner light” is our most attractive quality. I feel the more “free spirited” and happy I am, the more people magnetize into my orbit.
The true “flying solo” journey is really about nurturing my relationship with “Self.” It is about embracing life single and when we can truly embrace our “single self” we my find that being single becomes a choice rather than a circumstance.
We are all “single” in the deepest sense of the word. We call come into this world alone and we leave this world alone. We all have to make our own decisions, even if we are coupled, and we have to make the decision to do what is in our highest and best interest. Sometimes that might mean staying in a relationship, and sometimes it might mean letting go of one.
Many people won’t leave unhealthy, unfulfilling, or toxic relationships because of a fear of being alone. What I have found is that “alone” is a choice. When we can truly nurture our relationship with ourselves, we can more easily nurture relationships with others and enjoy the company of many people. We may not have someone in our life that we share a bed with at night, but for some of us, crawling into our own bed at night can be the most delicious part of our solo journey.I love my van bed! Just as I love my bed at home. Crawling into bed alone at night is my time of deep meditation. It is the time when I connect fully with the divine and process the events of the day. It has been a long time since I felt I missed having someone to share that space with. It would take a very special person to give that up.
Where I find myself today, the hiking is great! The temperature is in the seventies and the air is fresh and clean. The mountain peaks reach high into the sky and the waters are pouring down from the mountains from every crevasse. There are an abundance of streams, creeks and rivers, tall pine trees, aspens and other beautiful trees. In June the wild flowers are in bloom. I feel I am in bloom as well; fully alive; fully embracing the journey.And so the journey continues……
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Technology Dependency
One of the most frustrating aspects of my journey has been technology. Since I am still working and seeing clients, I am dependent upon technology and on the road, there are some real challenges.
I purchased a solar charging unit for my phone but it only actually worked once. So that was a waste of money. I have my car phone charger as a backup, but for some reason this is not working either. So I become dependent upon Cafe’s and Campground lounges to charge my phone and my laptop.
When I am in session for five plus hours a day, I run the risk of my laptop battery draining. I have a new Asus Zenbook which is supposed to have a good twelve hour battery, but I find I am lucky to get a solid six hours from it. I find myself having to book a “charging break” in my day and go have a cup of coffee or tea in a place with outlets.
My morning coffee charging time is mandatory. I begin each day with fully charged electronics and do what I can to conserve.Now I understand why having solar panels installed on the top of one’s rig is important. As I was watching all the youtube video’s of people who live in their Van’s or Rv’s, most will have a couple solar panels installed that keep not only their electronics charged but also their fridge. I would have to choose between my roof cargo rack or solar panels. It would make sense to pair down the amount of “stuff” I think I need to have, lose the cargo rack and install the solar panels. That would be next trip. I’ve already managed to get three weeks in and even with the electronics issue, I am managing.
Many travelers depend upon campground electronics. Campgrounds charge very good money for “hookups.” It is typical to pay anywhere from $40.00 to $60.00 per night for an RV hookup spot. Even if one spent $45.00 per night, plus tax, on camping, they would be investing roughly$1500.00 per month on parking. For some, this is simply factored into their budget, but for me, it doesn’t make financial sense.
What I have found about most RV parks and commercial campgrounds is they make the most of their real estate and don’t give a lot of space between units.
For me the whole idea of camping is to get out in nature. Not to be so close the camper next to me that I can hear every word they say, smell their cooking, hear their music and in some cases, even hear them snoring at night. To me, this is not my idea of a good time.
I understand that people with big camping rigs, just shut themselves in at night, like they would their homes, and turn on their television sets, their air conditioning and all the comforts of home. They really don’t hear their neighbors.
The night I had to put in ear plugs because I could hear the camper next door snoring, was the night I decided I needed more space around me.
Fortunately today, the summer solstice, the San Juan National Forests are opening back up, and so I get to retreat back into the forest, where there is a lot more open space. I also only take clients Monday through Wednesday, so I have some days free of electronical worries.
Overall I am so very grateful for our electronics, because it allows me to be “FREE!” I can go anywhere and still work, as long as I can get a signal. And this is why I am able to be on this “Flying Solo” journey.
Happy Summer Solstice!
