Travelling to Destination UNKNOWN

and yet travelling into the unknown is absolutely the right decision...

we travel
from here to there.

we travel.

we travel
from nowhere to somewhere.

we travel.

we travel
from the unknown to the known.

we travel.

we travel
every moment of every day -
in our minds,
in our hearts,
in the physical,
in the ethereal

we travel.

and in travelling
we grow

My boat sails upon a starry night and heads for Destination Unknown.

Do you ever feel like that? That you are sailing on a boat and while you have a vague idea of where you are sailing to, you are still sailing into the Vast Unknown.

The Vast Unknown of Possibilities, Challenges, Constants and Decisions.
The Vast Unknown of Successes, Abundance, Problems and Beauty.
The Vast Unknown of Clarity, Stillness, Connection and

Other.

The Vast Unknown.

That is how I am feeling at the moment.

The Vast Unknown is there right in front of me.

---

I have images flash before me.
Ideas of what might be.

The waves show pictures.
The stars twinkle ideas.

My heart too feels what might be possible.

And yet nothing is sure.

Do you ever feel like that?

Do you ever feel that you are watching,

waiting,

hoping,

acting,

moving

and staying still all at the same time?

That you know that moving forward is travelling in the right direction,
That yes your boat has been made specifically for this journey,
That everything about it has been created for this VERY moment in time,

and yet…
yet
there is doubt and, yes maybe, and possibly, fear and worry.

Or is it uncertainty and anxiety?
Maybe all…
Maybe all…

---

Looking at the supplies - will there be enough?
Looking at the mast - will it be strong enough?
Looking at my clothes - will I be warm enough?
Looking in the galley - will there be food enough?
Looking in my heart - will I be strong enough? brave enough? soft enough? gentle enough? patient enough? honest enough?

enough
enough
enough…

Enough!!!

What is enough?
What makes life enough?
And in the enough are we content?
And in the enough can enjoy our lives?

---

So my boat sails as all these thoughts blow past me.
There is change ahead.
There is beauty ahead.
There is adventure and life and wonder and dreams fulfilled ahead.

Sometimes the needle on my compass sways too much
the co-ordinates are hazy

Have I sailed out into a land so unknown that I am unable to feel safe?

Or am I sailing into the Lands of my Heart
where a compass will flicker
as my heart will take over?

---

I put my hand up for this journey many many years ago.
A journey that I knew would take me away from the Safe-Waters-of-life.

Yes, the Safe-Waters would lead me to islands and lands of wonder and beauty, however my heart yearned for THESE-Particular-Far-Away-Islands.

THESE places where the road is less travelled,

where the heart is the only true guide
and where the vastness is so big that it feels as though it swallows you rather than welcomes you,
and at the same time
IT DOES WELCOME YOU
for the vastness rather than swallows you

HUGS you.

And so here I am, in this absolutely exquisite boat with both sails up sailing into Destination-Unknown.

---

My life made this boat. With my experiences and hands, with my choices and my constants, with my laughter and my sorrows, with my failures and my successes.

And while I sail by myself the wisdom of my fore-bearers and teachers are still heard and felt in the joints of the timber, in the way I set the sail, in the way I balance upon the stern, in every knot I make and every time I read the wind, the stars, the waves.

---

And so I sail into the Vast Unknown with my heart to keep me company and, yes my Doubts to tangle the knots.

Why I wonder do the Doubts want to sail with me?

Why I wonder did I ever bring them along?

Why I wonder have I let them keep me company for…
for as long as my life is old?

My Doubts -
are they there to keep me real?
are they are there to keep me on track?
are they are there to keep me humble?
are they there to remind me of my journey?

Doubt.
Doubt sometimes brings Anxiety and Worry along too and hides them in the hull.

I saw Anxiety the other day. And Worry. They made me double guess my hearts truth. They made me stumble and trip. They made me pour the kettle over and over again.

Long nights we sit together. Tea drunk and left cold. Wind howling and body freezing. Rain pouring and coats drenched. Waves tossing and body swaying.

And the night is only getting darker.

I chose this journey. I learnt all I needed to before I set sail.

I was told I would learn more on the journey.

There really is no instruction book when the waves are so big and the dark is so dark and the Doubts and Worries and Anxieties want to untie all the knots.

There is nothing in the Vast Unknown. In the Wild Tempest and Raging Waters. There is NOTHING.

And yet

there

IS

SOMETHING

There is the wood.
There is the water.
There are the stars.
There is the wind.
There is the cold.
There is the wet.
There are the knots.
There are the sails.
There is the anxiety.
There is the knowing.
There is the movement.
There is the breath.
There is the heart beat.
There is the horizon.
There are my hands.
There are my feet.

And there are the hours upon hours of previous practice,
that now just flows in my hands, my heart, my body.
Without thinking.
Just Knowing.
For when I think I stumble.
When I think now when the rain is making seeing hard and the howling wind is making hearing impossible, to think takes too much energy.

To Know becomes Natural.

So I go back to the Natural.
And in the Natural there is the Constant.

That innate rhythm that beats -
like my heart,
like the waves.

The waves that come in
and the waves that go out.

They are constant. Even though they are big. They are Constant,
and in their Constant they are like Stalwart Guardians holding me safe and tall.

And I sail.
Sail into the Vast Unknown,
and I wonder if Doubt, Worry and Anxiety will always be my sail mates, or if when I sail into the Vast Unknown I will understand them more, maybe even find them their true home,
and then when we meet again it maybe quite different to now.

In honour of your own journey
into Destination Unknown.

---

---

What has your experiences been in travelling into Destination-Unknown? Who hid in your hull? What were your Constants. Please feel free to share…In honour of your journey.