Traveling Home
Always be at Home, living from your heart - especially when traveling!
The warm comfort of the space we call home is treasured because it's a rendering of that sacred space we find within our being.
Each person on this planet could offer a uniquely different definition of home, yet there is a connecting feeling of its essence that is core to our sense of belonging.
But what happens when the spirit of adventure calls and you find yourself miles away from the familiar corners of your daily world? How do you carry that essence with you, ensuring that no matter where you are, you're never really far from home? Traveling beyond our usual familiarity can stimulate our imagination, expanding the sense of who we are and who we can be with sights, lights, sounds, and smells to create lifelong memories. This guide is dedicated to the wanderer and the homebody in all of us with ways to elevate our journey and increase our sense of living, while at home.
Packed with Purpose
When it comes to packing for your travels, here are a few essentials to help you quickly drop into your heart sense while keeping your body ready for the adventure ahead!
First, let's take a breath! Breathe in for a count of 4, hold that breath as you count to 7, then slowly release your breath as you count to 8. You may have heard of this technique before. It was conceived and popularized by Dr. Andrew Weill of the Arizona Center for Integrative Medicine. While it seems like an intangible given, re-membering ourselves through conscious breathing is a powerful way to create calm for your nervous system in new or uncertain environments.
Next, your nose knows the way! The olfactory system is a navigational guide of preference. It also serves as a trigger for emotions and comforting memories. Taking your favorite scent from home, or a favorite essential oil (one of my favorites is peppermint!) can help you process new elements while creating space in your mental landscape with beautiful memories. I find this gives depth and vivid feeling to the scenes in my mind while absorbing new information in front of me.
Last is a small and practical way to relax your body AND help ease yourself into new time zones - facial cupping! Convenient and simple to use, this tool has been a loved addition to my esthetic practice that can easily accompany you as a means to keep lymph moving even when you have to be seated while flying or riding in a car. Gently gliding a silicone cupping tool along the pathways of your face can move stagnant energy and fluids that tend to pool when our bodies are not on the move. Begin along the jawline and move up towards and then behind your ears. Follow the flow down your neck towards your lymph nodes below your collarbone. Do this on your forehead and cheeks as well from the center point of your face moving towards and then behind your ears down your neck. The key to success here is to follow with increased water intake for flush fluids to their exit!
You Have Arrived!
The journey gives way to your destination as you gradually acclimate to your temporary stay for the trip. Taking another deep breath, inhaling the atmosphere for your first impression of home away from home, you scatter a few personal items like your books or a candle, welcoming yourself in with love. Keeping special routines as rituals, like bringing your yoga mat to welcome the day, can put you at ease in a new space. At the same time, you want to make space for new elements to bring joy and excitement to your trip. For example, I love my morning latte with espresso but if I had brought my coffee maker to Key West the first time I visited, I would have missed discovering my favorite coffee spot in the world - The Cuban Coffee Queen on Margaret Street with the best Cuban sandwiches and roaming roosters while you wait!
Bringing it Home: Decorate Your Space
When it comes to decorating, you will never find a more skilled artist than Mother Nature! From Her bold layering of texture and color to weaving light into space or creating chemistry when the earth kisses the heavens, we find endless inspiration to tap into and bring into our own homes.
Wandering abroad causes a magical dilemma; our wired patterns become disrupted and we must create stability for ourselves in a new moment working with unfamiliar elements. It is a healthy deconstruction of calcified information and in its place, mycelium-like networks emerge with up-to-date arrangements of who we are in this construct.
So for all the souvenirs, trinkets and tapestries you could bring home to brighten your more familiar space, it seems to me the most audacious, sophisticated, upgraded, re-wired, original and inspired piece of art to decorate with is YOU! Allowing the space inside you to evolve as Nature does is indeed a journey. It does require intention. But don’t worry - there are tips and tools to gain along the way! We will share them all here as we travel home together.
