Your Center.

Milagra Ridge, Pacifica

With every labyrinth, you have a choice.

Enter it. Or not.

If you decide to enter, there’s only one direction to walk. Towards the center.

Like most things, it’s easy to ignore and walk past. To put it off for later. For another time. There’s a million other distractions. That big project at work, emails, your partner’s needs. Your phone.

Wellness journeys are similar. You have a choice whether or not you’ll courageously step in.

But if you do, with each step you’ll shed old habits and learn new tools that get you closer and closer to the center.

To your center.

Strong Like Water.

My view during a late afternoon grounding/earthing session.

You tell me you want to be strong. But first, you must decide. Strong like rock? Or water?

One is heavy and grounded. Sturdy. It has the ability to crush and shatter.

The other is subtle. Soft and sweet. But give it enough time and it will erode the ground. Carve out a canyon. Carry the mountain into the ocean.

Choose Your Words Wisely.

Where you focus and how you frame things matters.

Along my morning walk I see a lot of “NO OUTLET” signs. It’s a tender, gentler way of saying “DEAD END.”

There are always two ways of telling the same story.

Words matter. They yield power and subconsciously shape our actions and how we view a situation.

My friend, freshly out of a 4-year partnership, decided to let his partner keep their apartment. Wanting to mend his tumultuous and complicated relationship with his mother, he is choosing to live with her (clearly this is leaning into discomfort) during this interim period. He looked at me and said, “It’s going to be SO HARD.”

Immediately he stopped and corrected himself.

“No. That’s a story I’m telling myself.”

He paused.

“This time together is going to incredibly transformational and healing for our relationship.”

I witnessed a powerful reframe. His new choice of words set the tone for an expansive time of growth and reconciliation. Yes, it will be so hard. But his new intention was couched in the larger setting of transformation and love.

Choose your words wisely. They set the framework for the house you live in and the future you create.

The Most Important Journey.

Forever grateful to Grandmother Ayahuasca for her divine wisdom, direction, lessons, and love.

“When you are no longer afraid
of the depth
or death,
even your own-
then you are finally free
to live.”
— Julianne Kanzaki

Before embarking on any type of journey, there’s always a sense of anticipation mixed with fear and excitement. You feel it when you’re corralled with a thousand other athletes waiting for the start gun to fire. You feel it when you’re waiting for your turn to go on stage to perform. There’s a pocket of space that exists between the preparation process and the actual event.

As we sat all dressed in white around a circle of flickering candles in 115 degree heat, I shared a piece of a spoken word poem I’d written last week:

Is it a breakdown or a breakthrough?

They are closer than they seem-

A caterpillar has everything that it needs

As it dissolves inside the chrysalis and starts to build its wings

It must surrender to the process before it flies free

And when you’re in the thick of it, it’s difficult to see

But exactly where you are right now is where you’re meant to be.

For the next 7 hours, we were each journeying in our own spiritual chrysalis- dissolving, breaking free from limiting beliefs, and emerging new and lighter.

The details of some experiences- like the 12-hour walk, plant medicine journeys, or even the most mind-blowing sex, are sacred.

When people ask, you can only smile and simply answer, “It was life-changing and unforgettable. I will never be the same again.”

Love is Everywhere.

When you learn to see, love is everywhere.

The parent who always nagged you to bring a jacket. Or asked you to call when you arrived to your destination. The friend who would deliberately make you change places while walking so he’d be closest to the street side, even if you were mid-conversation. The coach who encouraged you to race the 200 IM, even when you felt inadequate and afraid. The teacher who stayed after class to help you better understand a chemistry problem. The mentor who continued to meet with you weekly, even when you couldn’t see your own progress and felt frustrated. The friend who never abandoned you, even when everyone else was confused with decisions you’d made in life. The dog who wouldn’t leave your side when you couldn’t get out of bed. The partner who tucked love notes in your bag for you to find in the middle of your busy day, just so you could laugh and smile and be reminded of the simple things in life.

Love is everywhere when we learn to see.

Re-centered and Reshaped.

A few years after grad school, I returned home to live with my parents. I was broken, lost, self-destructive, and sad. It was impossible to see the way out of the hell I had created for myself. I just knew I was at rock bottom. Everything about my future was uncertain.

My dad gifted me the most powerful object lesson during that somber chapter. Sitting at the potter’s wheel, he held up a piece of clay.

“Sometimes the clay doesn’t turn out exactly how the Potter intended. Does this mean he throws away the clay?”

He paused, and gently looked me in the eyes. “No. He doesn’t give up on it. He simply re-centers and reshapes it.”

It’s been more than a decade since he told me this, but I think about it often. Sometimes life- in its lumpy, pathetic, lopsided form, just needs more time.

Needs generous amounts of patience and grace and second chances and hope.

Needs the humility to stay malleable.

Needs to believe there is something greater in store.

You may have thought you were destined to be a cup. And you felt angry and frustrated when you saw all the perfect cups around you while you were being shaped into something different. Trust the Potter.

You have a different purpose.

Perhaps you meant to be a bowl, deeper and wider.

Always Becoming.

Forest of Nisene Marks State Park, Santa Cruz

I feel as though I have completed a karmic cycle. In my physical space I am clearing and releasing an old version of myself that no longer matches who I am now. I recycled a board covered with old race bibs from my first marathon, Ironman, a few half Ironman races, and trail races. I recycled all the metals that hung from this board. Released articles of clothing that no longer fit my style and current aesthetic. It feels really good. I am grateful for everything that my younger self needed to learn in order to expand into who I currently am.

This space also needed an update. When I first started a blog back in 2008, it was called “Adventuresinswimbikerun.blogspot.com.” The younger version of me needed triathlon. It was a way to ground myself when my personal life had been blown apart. The structure of triathlon training provided me with certainty. I had a training plan with how many yards to swim, how many miles to run, how long to ride each day. The routine gave me a sense of security when every other part of my personal and professional life was unknown.

When I created this website, I automatically transferred my old writing over. Going back and reading old posts from when this writing/blogging journey began was sentimental. Many posts were cringe-worthy. And others made me reflect and smile because those parts of myself still remain very much awake and alive.

Like a snake shedding its skin, it feels cathartic to release the old and stretch into the new. Always changing. Always growing. Always becoming.

Here’s to the unfolding, evolving, expanding adventure of life. Here’s to all the things that morph and change and dissolve. And to those things that forever remain the same because they are part of our true essence and our divine nature.

Thanks for being here and for being with me on this journey.

Returning To Your Favorite Trail.

Boronda Ridge Trail, Big Sur

this sky

where we live

is no place

to lose your wings.

so love, love

love.

~Hafiz

The first time I hiked this trail was in 2016. Solo. I felt adventurous and brave and curious. I was craving new landscapes in my professional life and turned to nature to invigorate me with feelings of freedom and awe before I made the leap.

Life has changed for the better since then. Even though it’s a trek to access, I love coming back to this trail. It humbles me, challenges me, inspires me, and makes me feel small in comparison to the grandeur of nature. Cresting the top is a reminder of how all progress begins with small steps, and the importance of looking back to celebrate how far you’ve climbed.

15% elevation all the way to the top. A hefty test of aerobic and muscular endurance, but enjoyable with the best company.

Some trails beg to be revisited even after many years. Some friendships are like this too. Worth returning to and exploring again, even after many seasons have gone by. A well-marked path of respect and deep admiration remains, even with the shifting seasons of sun and rain.

True beauty never fades.

What you once loved and admired still remains is the same- their undeniably beautiful heart and magnetic energy and sense of feeling at home in their presence. Just as wonderful as you remembered. Sometimes even better than you’d imagined.