Soul Rehab

In the beginning of this trip (and I still have moments of this) I felt a loss of my self-identity.

Who am I if not the one who runs a business? Who am I if not the one who has a tight schedule? The one who has a house to clean and a million things to do on her to-do list? People to see, places to go. Always looking at the time. Chop Chop. Hurry up.

Now I’m living in a simple, quiet, peaceful room overlooking the jungle and ricefields. I can hear the river flowing below.  A breakfast of sliced fruit and scrambled eggs is brought to me each morning. I make my black tea from a plug-in plastic kettle.

A soft-spoken, sensitive man named Made cleans my place every day. Every so often I will come home and find that he has put beautiful tropical flowers in my room.

I don’t have Internet in my room which has nearly cured my computer addiction. Sometimes I go many days without checking email. (In America I would go, at the most, a few hours between checking email.)

I haven’t cooked, done laundry or washed dishes for months.

Bali has been all about rehab for my soul.

This rehab has not always been easy. But is rehabilitation ever easy? The word usually implies completely transforming one’s way of living life.

“I’m so busy,” was my mantra in California.

And I can (and sometimes still do) live that mantra here. I can fill up the time with yoga, plans to do this or that with my Ubud friends, lots of classes and working with healers.

But…

…after 5 months of living in a slow culture I’m beginning to slow down.

Finally.

Michael, a fellow Californian, has been traveling for thirteen months and he told me he is still, after all these months, finding parts of himself and his brain that are going a hundred miles per hour.

In the mornings I go on a leisurely ricefield walk on the path at the end of my street. Every time I walk by the coconut stand a tall, thin Balinese man with a sweet smile says,  “Please to buy a young coconut?”

Someday I will bring money on my walk and surprise him by saying ‘yes’.

It’s a simple life here in Bali with lots of time to just be and having this much unstructured time still rattles my ingrained American to-do list consciousness.

In slowing down I was surprised to discover that I still sometimes feel like I need to do a lot in order to justify my being.

I was joking with Sparrow a few weeks ago about wanting to have a t-shirt made for myself and fellow Americans which reads: Get a life, not a to-do list!

I still have a to-do list.

It’s usually in the form of an Internet list. Most of the Internet items are work-related, especially now that I’m looking to possibly extend my trip until August or September.

I’m still working out the details of what would be involved in extending my trip yet again. On a soul and heart level it’s feeling right to stay longer in Bali.

A (big) part of me is saying, “Should I really change my mind and extend my trip? Can I really do that?”

It’s the part of me that is ultra-responsible, very serious and a big pain in the ass.

Here’s what that part of me looks like: She’s a crabby librarian, always telling people to ‘shush!’, hair in a tight bun, pursed lips, she wears a wool skirt that is itchy and not at all attractive. Especially not in the tropical climate of Bali.

But a bigger part of me is saying, “My soul is just beginning to unfurl, finally, after all of these months of traveling. I am not yet ready to go back to America.”

This is the part of me that is becoming more alive while being here. It’s the part of me that is wise, that listens intently to the heart and makes decisions from the heart and not the brain.

She’s a beautiful part of myself.

She’s radiant and graceful. She doesn’t have the word ‘should’ in her vocabulary. She’s ultra-feminine combined with a tiger-like fierceness and (hell yes) she’s willing and able to go after what she wants and values. She also knows when it’s time to be receptive and still in order to fully receive what’s coming to her. She knows she’s worthy of expanding to her fullest capacity in all areas of her life. She is willing and able to enjoy all the time and money available to her in order to create a life that is truly worth living. She’s ready and able (hell yes) to take responsibility for the quality of her life. Right now.

I love her.

She wants me to stay in Bali as long as I can.

Because here’s the thing: I’m learning how to truly live by being here in Bali. To live in a way that has heart and meaning for me. I’m learning this every day, in nearly every interaction with the Balinese people and expats who live here.

Motorbike accidents sometimes happen here in Ubud but what is most common are ‘near accidents’. Where one person makes a near-fatal mistake and the two bikes come within inches of calamity.

When this happens in the States you know what the result is: swearing, fists and the bird raised, driving off in a fit of anger that spews to every other person encountered later that day as a way to release the anger even further.

But here? In Bali?

Smiles.

I kid you not.

I’ve caused at least 10 near-miss motorbike accidents while riding my bicycle in Bali and when we screech to a halt to avoid missing each other the Balinese person I’ve almost killed immediately begins smiling and laughing!

Like I’ve told the funniest joke in the world.

(Maybe near-death is the funniest joke in the world?!)

When an accident or near-accident is my fault (whether in the States or here in Bali) my natural reaction is to get afraid and then immediately angry. At myself. For making a mistake. And if it’s the other person’s fault, watch out.

The default emotion for the Balinese in times of stress is laughter.

The default emotions for Americans (at least this American) in times of stress are fear and anger.

But I’m learning something from experiencing the laughter and flashes of amusement in the eyes of the Balinese in these near-fatal misses.

I’m learning something in watching my reaction: in my heart pounding and uncontrollably-shaking legs and my brain which flashes to some future scene of being in an emergency room in some funky Balinese hospital.

I’m learning something from watching my anger that bubbles up with all of these experiences in my body and then watching the Balinese flash these delightful smiles and laughter in response to our nearly being dead that:

LIFE IS NOT TO BE TAKEN SO DAMN SERIOUSLY.

In other words:  Lighten the *%&^ up.

The lesson of Relaxing about Life learned from the Balinese comes up in other ways too:

“Sit,” the Balinese people will say when I ask a question.

“Oh, it’s okay, I just have a quick question,” I will reply, continuing to stand, one foot already poised for a quick getaway.

“Sit,” they will say, smiling.

I want to get to the point where they don’t have to ask me to sit.

I’m not there yet.

I’m still standing and still poised for a quick getaway.

In Bali, it’s about establishing connection while in America it’s about getting the information and running with it. On to the next thing. Do I even remember what the person looked like who answered my question?

Usually not. Because I was already moving on to the next thing in my mind.

How does one slow down after moving at a rapid pace for many, many years? After 5 months of living in slow culture (India and Bali) you’d think I’d have mastered this by now but

no.

Going slow, having lots of unstructured time, still freaks me out.

Another thing about Bali: people stop by each others’  homes–often- to hang out and just chat. Work of any kind will stop in order to give priority to conversation. To maintaining connection.

What’s also great for me is that I can ride my bicycle to most of my friends’ homes here in Ubud because it’s a fairly small town. I’ve never lived in a small town before and I realize I really like it.

When I told my taxi driver the other day that I was from America he leaned over his shoulder to look at me in the backseat and said,  “I’ve heard that people in America don’t talk to each other. That they are too busy to take the time to talk to each other. Is this true?”

His eyes were sad when he asked the question. My eyes were sad in response.

Anyway, on Tuesday I’m at my friend Esma’s house and, as is typical in Bali, all these people are stopping by. One after the other after the other came by her house to say hello and chat.

One guy from Holland stopped by to talk to Esma about low-tech technology. Low tech?

In California it’s all about high-tech, the latest this and that.

Not so in Bali. Even the technology being discussed is slower-paced.

And speaking of that, now it’s time to get off this computer and back into the face-to-face version of

living life and connecting with people.

Tagged as: Bali soul rehab, Soul Rehab, Ubud soul rehab