It’s such a cliché to hear that you find love when you’re not looking for it. Yet here I am, one of those clichés.
My divorce in the late ‘90s came quickly and unexpectedly. From having just moved into the house of my dreams, to now being alone for the first time in my adult life, I felt confused, withdrawn and hesitant to commit to any relationship.
But within this great upheaval was the seed for the greatest transformation, as I began taking those first tentative steps towards knowing and accepting myself, and towards love of self above all else.
It was with this inner focus that I showed up on the Camino in May of 2001. I didn’t prepare. I didn’t plan. I had quit my corporate career nine months earlier, and begun to travel alone. My intention was to find the meaning in my life that had until then eluded me. I was also experimenting with a new spirituality, trying to shift my focus from living in my mind and its need to control every aspect of life, to living from the heart, learning to trust in myself, in others and this magnificent Universe in which we live. Rather than avoid my fears, I wanted to face and heal them. Rather than close off from the world, I wanted to embrace it.
From the deserts of Egypt to the beaches of the Mediterranean, I wandered as a tourist until I found myself at the foothills of the Pyrenees Mountains, in St. Jean Pied du Port. I had read Shirley MacLaine’s account of her pilgrimage on the Camino; that was my only preparation. In 2001, there were few guidebooks or resources as compared to today. So, I showed up, bought the only English guide I could find, and began walking.
At first, I followed the guidebook religiously, walking the miles it suggested and sleeping in the places it recommended. But how could I learn to trust in myself, in my intuition, if I was continually following the book’s advice?
<<< The rest of this story can be read on the pilgrim blog The Camino Provides >>>.
My thanks to Laurie Ferris for sharing our story on her blog.
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