Yamina➡️

Shalom from Tel Aviv as I write this, hence the Hebrew title of this post. “Yamin” means “right” as opposed to “left”. It’s used in the directional sense. This trip, like all my trips have done lately, has given me new keys to new doors. No matter how many plans we make, tickets we book, tours we plan, we never seem to arrive at our destination. That’s just how life is meant to work; we reach one crossroads only to keep choosing where else to go next. Even if one climbs to the top of a mountain, they will then choose to go back down, which route to take on the descent, which supplies they’ll need etc. We are never not faced with the concept of “onward”. There will always be some part of life demanding movement, current, and flow. There are so many aspects to my life I’m so in love with at the moment, but if I’m honest (and I am), I have so much further to go. There are still thoughts, reactive emotional patterns, fears, and doubts that belonged to the Old Me. I have recently been reading about how there are so many different versions of ourselves through the course of our lives. This is a fact. The four year old you is different from the fourteen year old you, and the forty year old you is light years away from those both. The eighty year old you would probably laugh at what the thirty year old you thought was problematic. None of these versions of you are ever wrong; they’re each a necessary stepping stone that make up new pathways to new doors. Of course, so many people stay away from new doors. They ignore the new directions being presented to them as alternative options. Afraid of change and therefore resistant, many convince themselves they are just fine as is, not understanding that you can love your life yet still find expansion. Wanting more doesn’t have to equal wanting radically different. Keys are meant to be used, and I was handed a key on this trip to Israel. I was presented with a situation that had the old me reacting in the only ways she knew how; anxiety, doubt, some shame, fear, mistrust, and disappointment. The mind of the old me went off the rails, and had a field day trying to infect the New Me with her old poison. The old me burst forth from her holding pen many times, but at this point the new version of me is stronger. She’s been working out and faithfully taking her vitamins. She knows herself better. She has amassed solid abilities of discernment. And I, being the keeper of all these versions that come to visit and always leave when they are no longer relevant, have the power to bang my gavel and sentence the old me to jail with no chance for parole. The I, my Self, is the one constant on my life. Each human on earth is designed as such. In prying the old and new versions of me apart from one another, I am able to tell myself, “No. that’s the old you. You aren’t her anymore. The new you reacts differently.” I recently vowed to myself that I won’t bring the old me into my new life. Ever again. Sure, she will always try to pop up and derail me, but her powers are rapidly weakening with each new key I turn. These keys are gifts, and are handed to us at the exact moment in time we are ready to receive them. If we waste them we are fools, and I didn’t come this far in life to waste anything. The challenge I faced was a chance for me to level up, control old thought patterns, and create space for new, healthy ones. It always works like this, and so the new me was able to hold onto the gratitude buried under the situation. I was able to choose right every time. The more I do this, the sooner it will become second nature, and create yet another version of myself. The new me is more accepting of discomfort and no longer tries to maneuver her way out of it, as she trained herself to do. The new me trusts the universe, which banishes fear. The new me has so much proof of divine love and guidance. The new me is more patient, more restrained, calmer. She’s vastly superior to her outdated counterpart, and so she is the stronger one in the ring. If we don’t view challenges as great opportunities, we won’t survive the human experience. We will go bonkers at every turn, and it’s a shitty way to live. We don’t grow when everything is comfortable and predictable, there’s no catalyst. And so once again, in the holiest of lands which feels like home every time I touch down there, I had the chance to choose my direction. I chose right. Yalla, Habibi, yamina!!!!