Accept. Accept every moment that is given to you. It’s never going to return, or repeat itself. Accept the truth as it is. Let it awaken what no one has awoken within you before. Nothing is forever, everything changes. So let every feeling, every experience, every emotion give you exactly what you need. Something new. Something different. Let that sense awaken, the one that’s going to wake you from a deep sleep. Accept yourself and everything that surrounds you, everyone that comes your way. 

Accept changes 

It’s only a fraction of what I’ve learned on my 10-day vipassana meditation. In a time when I didn’t think anymore, just went with the flow and let it take me where it had to. When I returned to Cairns, after ten days of complete silence, natural silence, I made a decision. I accepted the fact that I’m not going to stay here. That I won’t insist on my original plan. I took all the moldy clothes that waited for me in an old, beautiful, dark-wood wardrobe and threw them in the washer, then started arranging the remaining ones. I bought the ticket and let my roommate know I was leaving. Onward. Into the unknown. Where I said I wouldn’t go. To being a waitress. Why? Because I’ve been given an opportunity. Because I could. Because I had to. After two months of traveling, looking for a job and enjoying every moment, the savings were gone. 

Unknown friends 

I used those few dollars I had earned by cleaning apartments for a flight to my Brisbane, where a friend picked me up at the airport. I don’t actually know him, but he looks kind and trustworthy. He’s Slovenian. He knows how I feel, he knows how much it means to me that someone is willing to open a door for new opportunities. He offered me help and I accepted it. Before meditating in the beautiful village of Pomona, I would never have done that. Accepting help? Me? Never. I can do it on my own. As my family would say: “She goes to sleep banging her head against a brick wall.” This is (was) me. Why would I accept help if I knew I didn’t need it? When you learn how to take a deep breath, close your eyes, feel every beath on your skin, every tingling caused by your surroundings, you learn how to accept that too. 

Military practice 

Once I had washed all my clothes, said goodbye to all my friends who I’ve gotten to know in an otherwise lovely Cairns, I realized that everything I packed won’t fit into my lovely, turquoise backpack. A soldier offered me help. The one that fought in Afghanistan and is, at my age, retired due to disability. I took it. Again. “One can tell that you haven’t been in the army,” he pronounced when I came over to him with my backpack and three bags of clothes. We folded intensely for three hours. A piece of clothing after a piece of clothing. From the largest to the smallest. If I had done it on my own, it would have taken forever. While having a deep conversation about what’s really important in life and how much life experiences are worth, three hours went by in a flash.

If you are interested in learning more about his story from Afghanistan and his return to Australia, please come back to this page soon.