Gratitude

I love reading. That's part of me which I adore the most. My curious nature, keeps on wanting to explore everything and next to travelling and talking to people my favourite way to do, it is to read. Already when I was a little girl, my dad took me to his school's library and I picked books. Books to read. I don't quite know how I chose them in the past, I know I need to feel it now. And after strolling around library for about an hour I picked so many books my dad had problems carrying them back to the car. I always smelled them, touched them and they had a special place in my room, so I could look at them. And although I moved around a lot, I always took books with me. It's books that remind me who I am and what I love. The problem was when returning home and my luggage was always over-weighted just because of all the new book I bought. And I know exactly where I bought each book I have or whose gift is it. Lately what I read most are all kind of spiritual books and guides and self-help and ezotheric reading. All kinds, from every part of the world. And you know when you read a book and while doing so you think to yourself, OK I have this figured out, hmmmm this is an interesting point, yes I do understand this, ok this part lost me and I guess I'm not ready yet etc etc etc...And I always came to a point which I didnt really believe or I had no idea how on earth all religions of this world and greatest spiritual leaders write about and it's called universal love and eternal gratitude. There two concepts were always a mistery to me and I though that only great minds have the ability to really feel it and understand. To have this endless feeling of love just by sitting somewhere, being alone and not doing anything.

And today I'm grateful. I'm endlessly grateful that actually I can feel a tear of pure joy on my cheek just now, because of what I can feel in this very moment. It's called unconditional gratitude and yes, this special feeling of universal love. In my mind that's called "feeling life". And I feel life and gratitude for it. I have this easy smile on my face, feeling in my heart and no questions in my head. When miracles have been happening in my last week. When I have a feeling that all the good things I did in my life for others are somehow coming back to me. When I just feel the universe in me and I'm endlessly grateful for all my life experiences and challanges and obstacles. I think that for the first time in my life I'm actually proud of myself and who I am. I feel the love to live and life itself and the more I spread my love and energy around, the more I get it in return when I least expect, actually don't expect at all.

Ever since I can remember I had this feeling inside me, when I felt if people need me and how do they feel and what do they need. Lately of course and with the development of my being it's easier for me to understand what's been going on, but in the past I just helped people. My intuition and sense of morality have been highly developed. I had to curve it a bit to know why am I doing something, but helping people in any possible way I can, is what i love the most and what I know will be doing all my life. In the past month I was faced with many situations when people called me, came into my life when needed me...anyhow I helped them. I didn't really do much, I was just there for them, talked to them, took time and listened. And I really mean listened. And what i got in return was gratitude and love. Maybe they're not even aware of it, but when receiving the messages and sincere thanks, all I felt was love and gratitude. And I have experienced some of the most beautiful moments with people around me, when again I felt grateful to have the opportunity to enjoy the nature and talks and laughs and also cries...because we are made of all this. Good moments and bad ones. And I am grateful for those as well. And all this was expressed without anything in return. Nobody wanted anything in return - neither I nor people around me. In the end there are always two words which have been changing me lately and my sould and what I do and what I want to do in the future: thank you.

Thank you Life. I'm grateful for my friends who stayed in my life when I was at my lowest, I'm grateful for new relationships at my work which are sincere I can again have some people around me to whom I can turn to. Thank you for sporty days and lazy afternoons, cooking dinners and being invited to some. Thank you for listening to me and sharing your deepest thoughts and emotions in the middle of the night. Thank you for sticking with me, when I know I took your energy and didn't give anything in return. Thank you for the supportive words and honest hugs. Thank you for helping me moving boxes and reparing the little things in my apratment. Thank you for being there at me when I was shouting and crying and thought I'm going to die when driving on the highway and  you didn't run away. Thank you for watching sunsets and sunrises with me. Thank you for being part of my life and making me who I am now so I can write this blog. Thank you also for the tough times, cause without this I couldnt feel what I feel just now.

What I actually wanted to say in the first place is that I know this very moment what all the books were about. What do they mean when they write about universal love and gratitude as the most important ingredients of life. I feel it. So in the end, when you don't know why you're fighting for or feeling low, know that this is a very unique path you're on, nobody has yours, we each have our own, but in the end it's worth it. I'm just a human being, go to work, have to cook and clean and pay the bills, yet a living proof it can happen, one moment you can feel gratitude and love. And trust me, it's such a feeling I'll remember for the rest of my life. And this is also why I will keep on going...for this moment and this feeling.

I feel me. I feel love. I feel Universe. I feel Life.I feel thank you.

And it came

Listen.

And it came. I craved for it for a long time, for so many months, maybe even years and now it's been here for some weeks. This unbelievable feeling of peace and serenity in my heart. It feels surreal and I dare to hope and believe it's here to stay a while.

It didn't come without a fight. A very intimate and deep fight even in my dreams, when black and dirty beasts fought between each other. And then there was the largest snake possible, trying to bite me and yet it was dry and my best friends told me, it's dead, gone.....it was dry like fall leaves. And the beasts rolled down the hill. And then I was standing in the middle of the highway, a place which brought out the deepest emotions I had inside me, became wide and sunny. There was a voice behind me, saying I've made it. I came to an end and it's all okay. Awful storm behind me and peaceful clear sunset infront of me. And then I jumped from a cliff 7m deep into the sea and opened my eyes. And I wasnt at the bottom, but on the surface, and all I had to do was breathe. These were the crucial dreams I believe. A sign sent from up above and saying "hey you, you've made it. on to the next one".

And I became grateful that I can again have relaxed dinner with my friends and laugh until my bones hurt. That I can go out to a concert and not feel like i'm going to faint anytime. Go jogging and love it. Stroll around town and be a funky city girl who the next moment walks around forest barefoot and do all this while having a gentle smile on my face. And all this I can do free. Free of heavy emotions, shaking, tears, "what-ifs". Just me, but this time, a brand new me. And I cherish all these moments now. I no longer take them for granted, something that happens to everyone and is here to stay. And to remind me, that in life you need to keep on fighting. Fighting for moments, when you can watch shooting stars relaxed on top of a hill you've never been before, climbing up this special spots, which open a brand new perspective and with new people around. When random cooking in the middle of the week make an evening special, surronded by people you barely know, but feels like you've been friends forever.

I learend a lot from this chapter. I got to know the brave and strong me, the kind I never knew it actually exists. I know now, who my true friends are and I don't have any particular wish to socialize with the other ones. And what's the most important, I learned how to feel. Feel happy, sad, dissapointed, hurt, devastated, lonely, exciting, grateful, proud, scared and much much more. I learned what I believe each and every person needs to learn, especially before being a parent, cause the path to express feelings when you're three decades older is not something you'd crave for. This is a lesson, which made a profound impact to my being, my soul and my heart. It's something which changed me and fixed my broken inside. And I realised many of our family patterns, my parents traumas, cause I craved the most, what I couldn't get from them. And it gave me the courage to say out loud what I feel and think, to no longer keep it inside, "cause some people might not like it". Hey, you know what, I don't care anymore! I don't care if people don't like what I feel or think or how i'm dressed or what I do. If I feel it and I don't hurt people along doing it, I'm gonna swim naked and dance around and cry in public and sing out loud!

I still feel insecure sometimes though. Thinking all might come back, but then I always remember the dreams. The beasts and dry snake and I'm okay. Sometimes I still wish for that long comforting hug, but I learned that I first had to give it to myself. Put myself upfront before anybody else, before I can again give and accpet any other hug(s). And maybe, just maybe, that other special hug isn't far away...