Tapped-In & Touched.

"It could be worse. At least we're under the same sunset"

"The mouth obeys poorly when the heart murmurs." - Votairre

It's been a really long time since I've felt anything deeply enough that I needed to release it from my system. I'm not one to force myself to do anything unless I truly feel moved to. Expressing myself in written form seems to be a rare occurrence these past couple of years...until now. So, I guess - here's my once a year post.

The Human Condition can be defined as the characteristics and key events of human life, including birth, learning, emotion, aspiration, morality, conflict and death.

For as long as I can remember, I've been enamored with the Human Condition and how it ties back to how we operate, how we relate, and (for the more self-reflective ones) how we grow and enhance our own being. As someone told me once, "Being a person is hard." Humans are so varied, complex, layered & beautiful.

The Leaning

I recently met someone that almost instantly grabbed a hold of my still and steady with both hands and shook everything I knew-to-be just enough to bring more light into my chest. Apart from the chapter we were writing together in this early stage of getting to know each other, her many layers held onto my attention...which is not easy to do. Learning who she is as a human moving in the world and how her world operates has been completely intriguing, fascinating, motivating and unique.

I don't recall a time where I've encountered someone with such intention in almost everything she touches, experiences, says and does. There are no shortcuts for this one. If it matters, she will go all the way and never take the easy way out. What's more impressive than this is the self-awareness that life had always come easy in a previous life.

So, back to my point of intentionality, it is a deliberate choice for her to experience life - not just live it. And, this deliberation is something that happens with every decision.

I learned all of this before even setting eyes on her.

It's an interesting experience learning so much about someone before meeting them. More importantly, and something not to be ignored, is the connection that was undeniable and the type that is really rare.

The new puzzle is resolving having built and experiencing such an intense connection with meeting in person and being in the same room.

It felt...backwards. Normally, you meet someone in person then start swimming in the shallow end of the pool before jumping into the deep end. It felt like we both jumped into the 8ft end and navigating back to shallow waters. It's a space I'm extremely unfamiliar with - all of it - finding someone that I connect with this intentionally and deeply let alone doing all of this ass backwards.

However, the truth is: I don't play well in shallow waters.

"This is my heart; dive deep." - Andrew Belle

I asked myself: what was worth the risk, fear, energy and time? This. This was worth it. There have been so many repeated experiences where "connection" was there to some degree; but, I had never experienced something to this level of depth and consistency. I crave and thrive on sitting uncomfortably under the skin and find comfort crawling in the belly. There have been so many experiences where my time and energy were vested in the wrong places which then became unbalanced. I no longer enjoy driving down one-way streets; I'm very conscious of finding two-way roads these days. And this started to feel like the perfect crossing of paths.

I decided this kind of connection was worth putting in the energy and effort to discover and uncover what was there. There had been so much emotional build up, I needed to release some of that pressure. So, with 2 days' notice, I booked a place and grabbed a flight to meet the person that was consuming all of me and had me deeply distracted on a minute-by-minute basis.

The Learning

On a Thursday evening, I hopped on a plane and flew an hour south. I landed in, what use to be, a familiar place. While there was a small sense of familiarity, it's changed quite a bit since the last time I was there.

I had so many different feelings I needed to untangle. I was excited, scared, and really happy at the opportunity to meet the person that had been occupying so much of me. I didn't want to rush into anything; yet, I couldn't wait to meet her.

It's really interesting putting the pieces together. I can't say that it was all smooth and easy or anything like the movies. And, while there's a small part that fantacizes about the fairytail, this is also reality. Besides, nothing sustaining or worth it ever came easy. There were awkward moments and what I've learned is giving grace to periods of adjustment. I didn't take into account that I was out of my own element and didn't have control of much - which then just made for needing more time to settle in.

In those moments, I lived Votairre's quote of "The mouth obeys poorly when the heart murmurs." For someone who holds conversation and is traditionally very steady, I lost my words. It took some time for me / us to settle in. Part of me believes part of that experience was due to us holding back in big part because we valued our connection so much we didn't want to devalue or wreck it...just a theory...

What I don't want to dismiss are the moments where we did settle in. When we did, the connection saw itself to fruition. Time stopped. I had literal moments when I had to pause to take a breath...the moments in-between...I can hear her breath. I could have traced the outline of her neck, down her collar bone, up her shoulders, across her jawline...to find her lips...I could have done this for hours. I say this with great earnest.

It has been a very long time since anyone has taken my breath away in that way in those kinds of moments.

Now that I'm back home, I need some time to let the dust settle to look inward. I don't want to put any pressure on myself or on anyone else while not wanting anything to go to waste. I'm working on balancing those two things and don't have that part figured out yet. I don't know what the next logical and natural step is (I don't think either one of us really knows at this point.) But what I do know is the experience of getting lost in those time-standing-still moments with each other.

I don't know what's going to happen or where it's going; if there is an opportunity to find the lightness I'd like to explore that. But whatever direction this goes, and keeping in the spirit of Thanksgiving, I'm beyond grateful for meeting this person and all the things she's brought forward to date.

Soundtrack