RONDA WOLFE
I was wearing life like a weight-laden garment as opposed to a loose cloak. And I felt these weighted layers slough off each minute of each hour, of each day. I felt reborn of sorts, into me of faith, tolerance, love, and lightness. Exactly what I needed exactly when I needed it. Divine’s timetable, not mine. The seven-day stay taught me much about my patterns of buying into the stories that I have told myself with little evidence to support these limiting thoughts. I was awakened to the fact that of the 70,000-plus thoughts per day, my mind highlighted the ones that supported victimhood, helplessness, entitlement, and chaos. Somewhere along the way, I had become addicted to chaos in my life and my thoughts aided in their survival. Lastly, one of the key takeaways was the awakening to the leaning into life’s sucker punches and softening and becoming more malleable as opposed to tensing and becoming increasingly more rigid and indignant in my thoughts and beliefs. In my heart of all hearts, I needed to take a hiatus like this to calm my overextended nervous system and to help me shake up the mindless routines that did not serve me. This retreat of renewal, refreshment, and rejuvenation brought me to a whole new level of gratitude, appreciation, faith in the manifestation of hopes, the power of thoughts, the strength in faith, and how nature is quite the advocate for better health. Today I work daily to prevent burnout of mind and body. I take intentional self-care measures each day and many times a day. I take stretch breaks, enjoy walks with my pup, listen to bird languages being spoken, take relaxing baths, hydrate, eat nutritious food, be of service, take actions to show how much I value friendships and family, and spend quality time with the spirit only found the Now. The times of calling out “Uncle” have melted into subtle whispers at times, but that whisper ignites the retrieval of the lessons learned in my retreat experience. Soften, lean into the discomfort rather than shy away from it, cry if needed, find a place of peace, and let the spiritual back in and stopping, dropping and rolling, Taking that moment of pause between stimulus and response, stopping the storylines running in the background of my mind and rolling to open me up to deep cleansing breaths, then another then another, checking in with my nervous system, noting how I feel in my body and pushing off from there. As I push off, I feel the expanses and possibilities. I sense the caress of “maybes “which carries with it expensive hope and love. This is the gift that keeps on giving. When I restore myself to the presence of the peace within, I am better able to move forward with more love for myself and less criticism and focus on my foibles. Love Ronda x
HOLA SOBER | MADRID
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