Some days require, call to the soul, to lie on one's back and take joy in the blue above.
I’m still writing from the Click Away Photography Conference. Today is Friday (September 12) – Day 2. I thought the keynote from yesterday shook my world up and knocked me on my butt…boy was I was unprepared for the presentation this morning.
Today’s keynote speaker was Joy Prouty, and the title of her presentation was Dream Big.
I’m not even certain I can get out of my head and heart all of the emotions her presentation stirred within me. I found my heart relating to this woman I didn’t even know, on a level that is most primal amongst not only creative, but more importantly amongst women – mothers and non-mothers alike. As she spoke, I was pulled from the inside out to do something bigger, and better and beyond myself with the rest of my days.
She and her husband were ‘living the dream’ (or, what we all seem to think is the dream) when they felt the call to give up the material goods and spend 9 months traveling in a small trailer, with their 4 young (and I mean…YOUNG) children to see the US. They have settled in northern Washington State, in the country, in a very simple life. Now, she was clear not to sugar coat it…in any way…it is not an easy life – but simple doesn’t equate to easy. (You can read about her family’s journey here).
She spoke of a mother facing cancer she knew would take her from her precious family. She spoke of another mother losing her young, sweet boy to the ravages of cancer.
What did these horrible moments of life, and death, have to do with living simply and dreaming big?
What if dreaming big is finding the way to life a more simple and meaningful life for each of us: whatever that might look like? It would look different for each of us. We are not all meant to, or called to, sell everything and load up the family in a trailer to travel the states (Although…I dream of having my own glamper to travel around and get to know me a bit better).
However, we can all reach out beyond ourselves and make the world a better place – even in a small and simple way – that in and of itself can make life simply sweet. For some…for most…that will be doing something within your own four walls and within the structure of your own family.
We set our own limits, and often those limits are on us because we have filled our minds and schedules with the doings of life that we think are so important. The bigger the better we believe.
But that is just not the simple life for me anymore. I’m working to figure out what the simple life looks like for us. I don’t know what it looks like. I will process all of this through with the Rocket Scientist and we will talk (ok...I will talk and he will patiently listen) to work it out.
After all…the sky is not the limit – only we are our own limits!