Newsflash: Tribe Found in South Pacific!

Hello there! Sorry its been a while, but something very exciting has been happening..

I was just reading through some old blog posts and found a post about desperately missing my “tribe”. And I still do, very much. But the very exciting and lovely thing is that I have found another. Another group of people who really care about me; who I am, what I think and how I feel. And, what is more, I have felt the joy of simply being myself with reckless abandon again.

Of course the curse of it all is that by its very nature this tribe is transitory – I am always having to let someone go, and soon enough they’ll have to say goodbye to me and the grief I already feel at some day having to leave this place will become palpable.

But for now, I love that people laugh with me, and occasionally at me; that my social calendar is almost too full; that I have several people who will gladly give me full body hugs n the street; that I have platonic husbands (and wives!) willing to go away on weekends and shoot the breeze for hours at a time about the kind of stuff that floats my boat.

Friendship is truly transformative and I have a renewed perspective on life that I am entirely grateful for.

So if I say this is wonderful, believe me when I also say that my heart longs for my friends and family at home who get me and love me in a way that has provided the strength and foundation for this experience as well.

It strikes me that my cup of friendship runneth over – and I can only hope that I can give back to the people I love – the rich gifts I receive.

In short. I love yous all.

vibemail

There are some crazy-good vibes going on in my world today and I'm liking it!

A little piece of wisdom crossed my desk this morning on keeping connected whilst away (can you believe it?!) and I realised of course that all the people I miss are not so very far from me and that I have the power to draw them close any time I like.

The wisdom that was conveniently delivered to my inbox from the cool cats at dailyom.com was all about using common opportunities to remember loved ones and to make ritualistic agreements about sending and recieving loving vibes. Then, all you have to do is tune in to the universe to pick up your "vibemail" as I have dubbed it.

When I was reading the email from dailyom - I started thinking of all the ways I already do this. One gorgeous friend and I pretty much have an agreement that rain on the rooftop is a shared opportunity to sit and remember eachother fondly; even when we're apart. With the wetseason kicking in - she's getting a shitload of lovely vibemail these days! Another of my friends has claimed the waves; we send each other our hearts and minds - troubled or clear - as we stand by the sea and we hope that each recieves the other by osmosis; thoughts arriving at our feet tangled in foam or wetting us through with rain. Some friends have songs on the radio and I occasionally find them between the reggae and gospel; others have flowers and one has every time I pick up my guitar.

I have been focussed on the ache in my chest for home; a longing to spend some quality time reconnecting. As always, the capacity to refocus and ease the ache a little lay within.

So maybe drop me a line sometime to let me know if there's a particular part of your day that reminds me of you that we can share. Til then, tune in for your vibemail my lovely friends - and I'll tune in for yours.

Where's my Tribe?

This morning, my best friend since childhood wrote on facebook that she was looking forward to having Brunch today with her tribe.

I miss my tribe.

Lately, I've had an ache in my chest for home that has been a little debilitating.

Life here has become an endless round of work and coming home to stare at the computer screen - doing more work to pass the time between the short and infrequent snipets of conversations with friends on skype or facebook.

I miss going out for breakfast and a stroll in the little urban village where I feel most at home - where members of my tribe I don't even know surround me; I miss always having some social event to look forward to - the celebrations and rituals of my tribe; I miss having good friends close by who I can drop in on for a cup of tea and the tribal audacity of being myself with reckless abandon; I miss passing the time at the movies or shopping with my best friend - the tribal ritual of Saturday "stuff" we do. I miss the ease of communication and problem solving that my comes with living in a developed world tribe - and - strangely enough - I even miss hanging out with my ever strange and complicated closest tribe - my family!

When I took this job, I knew that it would come with some challenging experiences, I just never thought that feeling so disconnected would be one of them. This weekend has been better - I've been much more social and perhaps I am lifting a veil that has been camoflaging a tribe I just didn't look for hard enough, but this is a strange little half and half world where I feel connected to a group of people - both local and expatriot- who appreciate me but who don't really feel a conection back to me; as much as I might be liked, I am not accepted - and there's a big difference. It's a tribal difference.

I think in all of this, my fear is also that my tribe at home is changing - as tribes do - and that when I go home I'll continue to feel that sense of isolation even though I'll be right there. Right now, my tribe are having shared experiences without me, meeting new people, making their own new family tribes and building friendships around those shared experiences. I know its something that has pushed people before me to roam an ever increasing world in search of an ever decreasing tribe.

I don't want that for myself. So in the meantime, I try to stay connected - not just to my tribe - but to their experiences - to their thoughts and feelings. It's hard because much as I might want that and have the time for it while I am here - they are busy actually having those experiences and I am met - not with the beating drums of their thoughts but instead, with a wall of silence. Which is a lesson in itself. Perhaps being pushed to seek further experiences of my own, to really question what I want those experiences to be and what results I want them to yield for myself and others - is something to be done in moments of quiet solitude.

It's just that I find quiet solitude so much nicer when your tribe are all around you - close enough to touch.