This past week or so I have lost some focus on planning, thankfully I have friends and family to keep me in the present and remind me of my trip. Deb, my friend I am planning to go to India, to the Ladakh region, with sent me a package of Ladakhi treats, including a video put out by ISEC, the International Society for Ecology and Culture called Ancient Futures, Learning from Ladakh.
I am getting ahead of myself though. This past few days I have been thinking about intention. What is my intention for this year of adventure? I already have one theme, that is community, intentional community specifically. My intention is to visit a diversity of intentional communities observing what practices have sustained those that are decades old, and pinpoint what issues are difficult to overcome. In Mexico (Chiapas) and in India (Ladakh) are two examples of communities at a larger scale that have been able to be autonomos from larger government and work together for the good of all. From there the bike tour is to examine perhaps younger and smaller scale communities in the US and Canada, to see what has been done here and what more could be done.
I will continue to think about intention and will create a more personal intention with each month and each week and each day during my adventure.
These will include- spiritual intentions, physical intentions, planning and organizing intentions.
Thank you for reading good people!
Monday, December 28, 2009
Monday, December 14, 2009
The To-Do List
I am grateful for this space to write and organize my thoughts.
There is a lot of preparation for each section of the trip and I think and re-think the best way to go about organizing and planning.
I am beginning to see that merely organizing this trip is going to be an interesting experience and learning process.
The year is divided into three trips:
1. Mexico, Chiapas (perhaps other parts of Mexico as well)
2. India, Ladakh
3. Bike Tour to Maine via Canada and then south to the Carolinas and West to Tennessee and then North to Michigan.
The part I feel the need to organize most is part three- bike Tour. I have already spent hours pouring over the Intentional Community Directory website making a list of contacts, referring to maps to figure out where and when I will need to stop.
I am anticipating the start of the bike tour to be intense, having just come back from Mexico and India, not giving myself much time between my return from India and the beginning of the bike tour I will need to have all my equipment ready to go. Which leaves me wondering exactly how much time to spend in Mexico, the first trip, the one I need to get a ticket for right now!!
In between Mexico and India I will be preparing for the bike tour quite a bit. I am beginning to see some disadvantages to trying to fit so much in in one year. I want to wholly experience each part of the trip without having to ponder the next leg too much. For this reason not only do I want to get the bike tour portion organized but I think that may be the part of the year I will find the most challenging, perhaps the most rewarding.
Not to get a head of myself or anything!
I am off to see about some tickets for Mexico and write the office of Learning from Ladakh with my resume and a letter about how I proposed to be involved while there.
There is a lot of preparation for each section of the trip and I think and re-think the best way to go about organizing and planning.
I am beginning to see that merely organizing this trip is going to be an interesting experience and learning process.
The year is divided into three trips:
1. Mexico, Chiapas (perhaps other parts of Mexico as well)
2. India, Ladakh
3. Bike Tour to Maine via Canada and then south to the Carolinas and West to Tennessee and then North to Michigan.
The part I feel the need to organize most is part three- bike Tour. I have already spent hours pouring over the Intentional Community Directory website making a list of contacts, referring to maps to figure out where and when I will need to stop.
I am anticipating the start of the bike tour to be intense, having just come back from Mexico and India, not giving myself much time between my return from India and the beginning of the bike tour I will need to have all my equipment ready to go. Which leaves me wondering exactly how much time to spend in Mexico, the first trip, the one I need to get a ticket for right now!!
In between Mexico and India I will be preparing for the bike tour quite a bit. I am beginning to see some disadvantages to trying to fit so much in in one year. I want to wholly experience each part of the trip without having to ponder the next leg too much. For this reason not only do I want to get the bike tour portion organized but I think that may be the part of the year I will find the most challenging, perhaps the most rewarding.
Not to get a head of myself or anything!
I am off to see about some tickets for Mexico and write the office of Learning from Ladakh with my resume and a letter about how I proposed to be involved while there.
Friday, December 11, 2009
Pre- Adventure
The end of 2009 and the adventure has already begun.
I have been living in a loosely organized intentional community for the past 6 weeks in Grand Rapids, Michigan. And it has been while living here that I have been inspired to take a year for myself and have an adventure.
A series of events occured to lead me to the my adventure plan:
The decision I made last fall to make 2009 my last year at Groundswell Community Farm as co-owner.
Then a year of talking with and thinking about and visiting farm/ers in the Traverse City area to see if a possible work connection could be made. The Ware farm was happy to talk to me about possibilities and I was delighted to meet them and hope to be back there sometime in the future.
My friends at the Green House accepted my request to live and work with them in Grand Rapids for the winter.
A Clearness committee was arranged at my request by the Quaker meeting I attend in Grand Rapids. During the clearness an idea came of sojourn for a year.
The idea stuck and grew during a time of fasting and cleansing.
I read a book by Donald Miller, A Million Miles, in a Thousand Years. The stories therein inspired me to put in my life the activities and people that would make me the character I wanted to be.
I needed more time to do those activities and put myself in cultures that make the same priorities as I wanted.
I have been living in a loosely organized intentional community for the past 6 weeks in Grand Rapids, Michigan. And it has been while living here that I have been inspired to take a year for myself and have an adventure.
A series of events occured to lead me to the my adventure plan:
The decision I made last fall to make 2009 my last year at Groundswell Community Farm as co-owner.
Then a year of talking with and thinking about and visiting farm/ers in the Traverse City area to see if a possible work connection could be made. The Ware farm was happy to talk to me about possibilities and I was delighted to meet them and hope to be back there sometime in the future.
My friends at the Green House accepted my request to live and work with them in Grand Rapids for the winter.
A Clearness committee was arranged at my request by the Quaker meeting I attend in Grand Rapids. During the clearness an idea came of sojourn for a year.
The idea stuck and grew during a time of fasting and cleansing.
I read a book by Donald Miller, A Million Miles, in a Thousand Years. The stories therein inspired me to put in my life the activities and people that would make me the character I wanted to be.
I needed more time to do those activities and put myself in cultures that make the same priorities as I wanted.
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