ACMindworks

Tag: costa-rica

  • Back in the Homeland

    Jan 10: I’m now back in very familiar surroundings. Currently, my butt is planted at a table in a cafe where I’ve done a substantial amount of writing in the past, typing these thoughts into words while sipping on a crazy good cup of hazelnut infused hot chocolate. After two months of being submersed in various foreign, novel environments, its nice to be in a public place I’m fully comfortable with. Don’t get me wrong, fresh novelty is fantastic, and I remain incredibly grateful for every bit of my time in Costa Rica, but there is certainly a greater capacity for the system to settle in a space one is familiar with. And there’s no doubt that having had a good chunk of time away from this place is allowing me to enjoy it all the more at the moment. Absence makes the heart grow fonder and all of that.

    The duality of novelty and familiarity is yet another polarized life influence each individual needs to find balance with. Too much novelty leads to system overload and chaos; too much familiarity leads to stagnation and small mindedness. I tend to get fed up with places and situations relatively quickly due to the rate and pace my mind seems to absorb and process energetic information, churning up the need to change things with a degree of regularity that thus far hasn’t afforded my soul enough of an opportunity to properly settle into this human life process.

    It’s fair to say that my appreciation for the current coffee house providing this story’s setting is also being enhanced by the fact that I’ve been essentially couch bound since getting back into Canada. The wound on my leg has required a whole lot of slow down on the part of my motion-based motivations in order to speed up its repairs. Due to a number of factors informing my personal orientation, I haven’t wanted to get it looked at by a doctor. Not that I’m entirely adverse to medically professional intervention, but I do think attention has a quality of energetic information entwined through it, and I’m not keen on an objectifying, scientific (potentially arrogant) form of attention imposing its interpretation and assumptions onto the wound’s deeper meaning.

    Like I’ve mentioned in a previous post, I don’t believe in random chance, instead subscribing to the notion that everything is the result of unseen energetic arrangements. The damage and subsequent way my wound heals holds a specific symbolic meaning for me. As long as I can keep it clean and healing properly through my own efforts, I’d prefer to keep it clear of any other outside energetic effect. Just to be clear, I would not necessarily suggest anyone else follow this example, as a risk of increased issue could easily arise. This is simply an avenue of life experience in which I choose to exert my own free will. I’ll freely admit that there have been a few moments where I seriously considered that my leg may need the care of someone better educated than me regarding the workings of the body, but it appears to be the case that the wound is healing up quite well through the careful cooperation of natural bodily functions and my own administrations. It’s both looking and feeling much better. I still have to effectively stay off of it for the most part to maximize its healing capacity, though even that is thankfully starting to ease up, leading to my choice to walk over to this cafe to write this post.

    Obviously it has been a comparatively long while since the last time I felt compelled to write something here, but I’m sure my situation makes it clear why that would be. I’ve honestly been fairly tired almost constantly since getting back to Canada. Between the leg wound, a brief cold that took hold, processing all the arising thoughts and feelings regarding my trip, and a somewhat disrupted sleep routine, I have had neither the energy nor the ambition to conjure up anything to post here. But today I felt compelled to break that streak.

    It’s certainly been interesting being back in Canada, comparing and contrasting the vibe and affect of this country and Costa Rica. The first sense that really struck me about the people was how much colder, more uptight, insecure and disconnected they generally felt compared to Costa RIcans. The image that comes to mind for me is that, culturally speaking (which is to say, the quality of conscious collectively held), it’s like we’re slaves to an overly intellectual assumption of superiority and rightness—one woefully disconnected from reality. Costa Ricans felt warmer, more at ease with each other and the life flow, and held what felt like a deeper quality of trust in life. I suppose another way of saying it is that the egoic impulse is more subdued there compared to the over-exaggerated way it’s embodied here. Also, Spanish is a much more lively and harmonically pleasing language to listen to than English, even despite my inability to parse it.

    (Editor Aodhan here: As a counter experience to the previous paragraph, the morning after writing this, I went for a walk to a nearby park and everybody along the way expressed a bright, smiling hello to me. I’m not going to remove my previous observations—obviously, since it’s still here—as I still think there’s truth in it, but it goes to show the incomplete nature of many of our initial interpretations of things. Life is so much more nuanced than the reactionary mind is capable of perceiving. Good reminder not to get stuck in such quickly conjured definitions.)

    All of that isn’t to say that Costa Ricans are so much more superior than the folks here—far from it. There’s a degree of simplicity and a lack of boundaries more predominant in people there that the folks in this part of the world aren’t so riddled with, which I personally prefer. I suppose the positive qualities described in the paragraph above are just the things I found myself missing rather quickly upon returning—and are influences I think we could do with a little more of here.

    Interestingly, I’ve noticed (in comparison to the way I usually was before) that I’ve been naturally enacting a greater degree of friendliness and easy warmth with those I interact with, and the way people respond to me has been a lot more positive. I like to think that’s a quality I was able to absorb during my time in Costa Rica, and I hope to maintain it from here on out. After all of the communication challenges throughout my trip, it really is such a joy simply being able to talk with people again. I’m sure that inner appreciation on my part has something to do with the way folks are responding to me as well. We’re kind of starved for friendly connection here, being so much more competitively oriented, and perhaps even a little paranoid.

    I also find my new found appreciation and respect for beauty continuing to flourish and grow internally. More and more I’m recognizing the importance of its influence and affect, and the responsibility rooted in our relationship towards it, as its quality is innately rooted in the kind of attention we project onto it. We have such a fractured and schizophrenic relationship to beauty in North America, often either down playing and diminishing its value, or misusing it for power gain and manipulation. Both extremes damage the quality and capacity of beauty’s uplifting affect, and we all suffer for it.

    I was given the opportunity to explore a thought process this morning that follows along those lines with the very good and generous friend I’ve been so fortunate to be staying with. It’s an idea better explored in a post dedicated to it, but I’ll attempt a simplified synopsis here.

    From an esoteric point of view, you can essentially organize the nature of spiritual energies into four fundamental states: Divine, etheric, astral and material. Each of those states is essentially different qualities of light (brightness, clarity, purity, ect), itself effectively forms of information. We experience light on the material plane as solid form and tangible shape. Astral light can be thought of as lunar light; the images and ideas produced through imagination. Etheric light can be thought of as solar light; the true essences behind the images and the emanated life force underlying everything. Divine light is ineffable and incomprehensible, beyond the realm of creation, and the source of all that is.

    Above the earth realm, each of the expressions of light are essentially regulated by a polarized force. Think of a triangle. The point at top is where the light is focused and released, and the two  points on the bottom are the polarized foundation that stabilizes the light’s efforts. Lunar (which is to say reflected and diffused) light, or astral energy, is stabilized by the polarity of both conscious, intellectual mind (the organizing and contextualizing functions; abstract and objective), represented by Mercury, and sensory, feeling based bodily experience (the intuitive, responsive functions; tangible and subjective), represented by Venus.

    Venus is the archetype of beauty. Beauty has a profound affect when embraced, soothing the system and causing it to settle down and open up. Resisting and rejecting beauty’s power keeps the system closed off and tensed up, preventing sensory information from getting in. An over emphasis on intellectual processes (or power) leads to the diminishment (and potential debasement) of beauty’s value, as the conscious mind cannot fully grasp beauty’s affect. The archetypal image: Mercury looks at Venus and perceives her as a stupid, empty bimbo. Conversely, an over emphasis on aesthetics can lead to superficiality, vanity and vapid ignorance. The archetypal image: Venus looks at Mercury and sees him as a nerdy, ugly bookworm.

    That conflict (yet another manifestation of the Satunian split) fractures the mind and body, preventing either the higher awareness of intellectual thought or the settling and inspiring affect of beauty, disrupting the capacity for solar/etheric light (the emanation of raw life force) to illuminate the consciousness. Like all polarized influences, the necessary arrangement is the balance of both. Higher intellectual arrangement informing and organizing beauty’s presentation, and beauty bringing the awareness back to tangible experience in order to reveal the truth of its thought. When both work together, the excesses of either are toned down and the focused understanding of astral light can be achieved, allowing the consciousness to pass through the realm of fantasy and imagination and reach the greater mental clarity of etheric awareness (or Christ consciousness). An over emphasis on either intellectual abstraction or tangible aesthetic pleasure leads to continued astral confusion. Once more the authority and the hedonist must join together to form cohesion and clarity.

    Well, maybe that wasn’t as simplified as I was hoping, but its quite difficult to contain those ideas within brief explanations. Even what I wound up writing out here was very low resolution. Bottom line, I think we’d all seriously benefit by reintegrating a healthy, respectful appreciation for beauty into our contextual frameworks. I’ll leave it at that, and leave this post be. I hope you experience a lovely moment of beauty today!

  • A Final Word Before a Fond Farewell

    Dec 24: Today is my last day in Costa Rica. I would like to write out some of my thoughts and feelings regarding this whole experience while I’m still immersed in it, but I’m not sure how clearly I’ll manage to channel that into words. I’m pretty wiped out right now.

    Let me set up a bit of context here. It’s a moderately drawn-out journey from where I was, San Isidro, to where the airport is, Alujuala, so by the time I was finally off the bus, it was fairly dark. Rainy too, just to make it even more “atmospheric.” I had a short walk to the Airbnb I had booked, and obviously I was moving at rather rapid pace to minimized how much me and my (too much) stuff got wet. That lack of light coupled with my full throttled, forward focused efforts meant that I did not see the big ass hole waiting for me right in the middle of the sidewalk. Before I knew it I was suddenly belly deep in the ground and my left leg was vibrating with some very unpleasant sensations.

    Thankfully nothing was broken, either in body or possessions. Kind of a miracle considering how deep that hole was, how fast I was moving, and how much added weight I had strapped to me. But like I said, my left leg was clearly in rough shape.

    I limped my way to the Airbnb, and as soon as I got to where my bod was slathered in illumination I could see I was bleeding pretty badly. I dragged myself up the steps to my suite, went inside, turned on the light and checked out the damage. It was not a pretty sight. A relatively large chunk of flesh in my shin was disturbingly absent. I went into a kind of detached work mode, cleaning it as best as I could and covering the hole up, then limped my way to a nearby Wal Mart to snatch a first aid kit. Once I got back I more thoroughly cleaned and redressed the wound.

    By the end of all that, the adrenaline subsided and the pain kicked in. It was not a pleasant night, let me tell you. I had to be very careful how I positioned my leg otherwise the wound would start to tear and the pain would ratchet up. Thankfully I actually did manage to sleep, but I am pretty out of it today. Still, I felt compelled to write out something for this final day.

    The way I’m seeing it, this leg wound is meant to act as something of a reminder regarding what this trip has come to represent for me. Obviously, I tend to view the life process through a thick lens of symbolism, subscribing to the notion that all material experience is rooted in an energetic cause. Through such a lens, the left side of the body represents our feminine side, and our legs are the physical expression of what stabilizes us in and allows us to move through life. Both of those facets of the life experience (the embrace of earthly embodiment and the receptive side of the equation) are elements I’ve struggled to reconcile with internally for quite some time. Elements intimately entwined; effectively the same influence expressed in different ways.

    As I’ve mentioned before, I’ve long oriented towards an emphasis on the spiritual and abstract, with a part of that preference coming from a place of wanting to transcend the earthly, human world. As I hope I am managing to make at least somewhat clear throughout this blog project, I no longer believe there is any way to cheat your way out of this place; the task being to actually embrace it (through love and reverence). It’s been a fairly hard road getting to that point, filled with all manner of inner bumps and bruises along the way.

    Coming to Costa Rica was, for me, rooted in an intention to further heal and restore my connection to the feminine; to material, human existence. Bring heaven down to earth. Blend Yang with Yin. Lock the upward and downward triangles together. Heal the Saturnian split.

    As was previously mentioned, Venus, the planetary archetype of love, beauty and value, has a strong personal affect on me in Costa Rica. Venus also, obviously, is strongly associated with the feminine essence. It’s symbol is the exact same as the one for woman after all. I’ll reiterate that those Venusian qualities are already fairly predominant here, beyond just my own associations. The women are gorgeous and highly feminine, in the pronounced curves of their bodies, the way the decorate themselves and the very essence they radiate. They completely embrace their femininity here. The country itself seems to more easily embrace and appreciate the feminine essence just in general, substantially more than I feel is the case up in the northern and supposedly more educated part of the west.

    The absolute abundance of jungle is another expression of Venus’ touch, as she is also the fertile mother of the material form, best expressed through the Empress card in the tarot. Actually, the mother archetype is powerfully present here, flowing through the women very freely, another aspect contrasting the diminishment of the mother in countries heavily intoxicated with toxic feminism. Perhaps that touches in on what the greatest gift this experience has provided me: a contrast and therefore cure of sorts to that feminist poisoning soaked into my own system.

    Just to be clear, I don’t outright oppose everything loaded into feminist thought. I’m all for the respect and healthy empowerment of lady folk. As far as I’m concerned, everyone benefits from that. But like Christianity before it, the good ideas have gotten buried under a sludge pile of egoic power lust. Those thought waves are incredibly damaging, and they have certainly taken their toll on me and my relationship to various facets of the feminine essence.

    For my own internal restoration and cohesion, this country has offered an energetic influence that has acted as something of a panacea to that poison. I have no intention of digging into the details of what that entails for me specifically, because not everything needs to be shared or worked into words, but I can say that my enjoyment of and appreciation for beauty has very much altered, feeling much cleaner, freer and more respectful. There are so many ways in which female beauty, and beauty in general, are being misused, degraded and diminished, from all sides of the gendered equation. I have certainly drank from those polluted waters. It feels so much better to have restored a more exalted and reverent view of beauty within me, a process I intent to continue enhancing and refining.

    Another thing my experience in Costa Rica has stirred within me is a greater sense of just how important relationships are; particularly loving, close relationships. The combination of the blocks in connecting brought up through the language barrier and witnessing the incredibly warm, open, communal nature of the locals worked to emphasize both the need and lack for that within my own life, a feeling it seems so many in the west are struggling with. Again, I believe that Saturnian split is the source of this, the neurotic need to see oneself as superior (fed into by higher levels of supposed education, technological dependency and that constipation within the feminine, ie, the binding waters of connection, care and relationship) and the subsequent shame inducing swing into hedonistic, addictive and even nihilistic indulgence to fill the void of unfulfilled relational requirement.

    It’s not to say that Costa Rica is some perfect paradise. It’s certainly got plenty of problems of its own, but that’s just a part of everything here in the earth realm. That’s actually another thing this experience has really emphasized to me: it doesn’t matter where you go, there is no escape from personal and earthly bullshit. I’m very thankful for what this country has offered me, but I don’t consider it necessarily a better place to be than back home in Canada (despite how loaded with bullshit it is as well).

    While I’m sure I could easily keep rambling on here, as tends to be my mental nature, I do want to keep this on the shorter side. I’ll finish with a few other quickfire observations. The food isn’t anything special. It’s not awful, but it’s not great. And apparently pesticides and other chemicals are used very heavily here, so the produce isn’t even especially healthy. They really like everything loud. Music, speaking, watching stuff on their phone. Everything seems cranked to the max. I love that every city has a center, complete with a nice church, where everyone likes to hang out. I’d often just chill in these places, reading and watching all the activity. There are dogs everywhere, and many of them love to bark with easy regularity. The cats were more secretive and shy. Stuff isn’t cheap here compared to most other Latin American countries, but the over all standard of living and material wealth seems higher too. Still, there’s plenty of beggars everywhere you go. Sitting on the bus, watching the stunning landscape go by while listening to music made for some really nice moments. A lot of the people will attempt to communicate even if their English isn’t great and despite my lack of Spanish. It’s sweet that they would try, and I appreciate all of those moments of connection, but it could get a little awkward.

    All right, I’ll leave it at that. I may do a retrospective follow up a little later, but this will act as the last post written while here. I’ve got a long, early flight lined up tomorrow with a busted up leg, so I’m gonna take it easy the rest of the day. I hope you’re finding some time to do the same.

  • A Challenge Along the Path

    Nov 25: I decided to extend my time away from the workaway thing for now. I need some time to reorient somewhat and figure out how I want to move forward. I found myself a nice, cozy airbnb in San Jose that’s proving to be a perfect space for this process. This particular post is essentially part of that process.

    The thing is I’m starting to really question why I’m continuing with this trip. I’ve been at it for over a month now and I can’t say it’s really been sparking much inspiration within me. Costa Rica is a beautiful country, no question, filled with lovely people and interesting things to experience, but there seems to be something in me that’s either getting in the way of truly being able to embrace it or maybe just wants to go in a completely different direction.

    An undeniable factor at play in this adventurous instance compared to any other time I’ve done this sort of thing is how much more introverted I’ve obviously become in the last handful of years. Even though I still find the external world fascinating, my internal universe has absolutely become far more compelling. I think three major factors have contributed to this reorientation of my attention, all of them taking place with a degree of simultaneous sequence. The first is a strong element of disillusionment regarding relationships due to my previous experiences (undoubtedly a kind of trauma response), the second is the effects of the COVID-19 event, and the third is a major increase in my study of esoteric philosophy and the subsequent spiritual practices that were inspired. Effectively, it seems that these experiences have sort of synthesized together to cause me to become far more guarded against people and what I perceive as their impulse towards egoistic imposition, and to more vividly view material existence as illusionary.

    Perhaps another way to phrase it is that I have steadily been losing faith in the physical, human world and increasing belief in the spiritual and abstract. While the increase in the one side of that equation has genuinely brought me a level of peace, comfort and confidence I’ve never been able to achieve before, the decrease on the other side has left a growing lack. I’m recognizing that lack is of human connection. Communication, touch, energetic exchange, ego (or personal) encouragement and feelings of being embraced all fall under that umbrella, and the lack of it is wearing on a part of me. At times, when I feel the strength of spirit, I can view that lack as something to be endured in order to maintain a quality of being that can often feel unappreciated or otherwise taken advantage of and fed upon. But when the human animal part of me flares up, screaming its need, I tend to feel somewhat down and uninspired.

    I began to recognize this imbalance over a year ago, seeing how I was overemphasizing the spiritual and abstract at the expense of my own humanity, and have since being attempting to cultivate a greater quality of cohesion between those contrasting and seemingly contradictory parts of my being. I certainly feel I’ve made some headway on that front, but I still hesitate with the human side. It’s very difficult to look at the world and not see it devolving into excessive ego, superficiality, ideological insanity, materialistic greed, cult-like communities and straight up apathetic, nihilistic escapism. We seem to be a sick species, and as an effort to minimize my own mind being infected by it, I tend towards staying silent and contained.

    But that approach feels selfish. Like I’m withholding the love within me that should be shared. That wants to be shared. My choice to come to Costa Rica was rooted in an effort to heal the wounds of my heart, bring down the walls protecting my authentic inner nature and cultivate an increased capacity to communicate myself, my views and my experiences without expectation. Hell, this entire blog project is another expression of that intention. I can say with total confidence that I’m still entirely motivated towards those things and absolutely will not give up on them until the moment I pass from this world.

    But, man, am I ever struggling to actualize it here thus far. Not being able to communicate with people has been corroding my confidence in the endeavor and my strong aversion to communal experience (again, a known trauma response) is weighing the whole thing down even more. I feel such a powerful compulsion to love the world and the life within it, but also an equally strong resistance towards it and the corruption so casually, so carelessly indulged. I know much of the interpretation held within in that latter response is rooted in wounds I’ve accumulated, distorting whatever truth is present in such observations, but I’m not sure I can succeed at healing them if I don’t have people I can truly feel safe with, listened to and embraced for who I am, including these more challenging emotional parts of me. (Editor Aodhan here: I do in fact have a number of people in my life that care for me in this way. I love and appreciate each of you enormously! The lack was really just being felt in that particular moment due to being alone in a foreign country. Just wanted to clarify that.) I often feel like I’m expected by everyone around me to maintain the positive, to endlessly supply the good, to reassure and uplift and express words of inspiration while they get to unload their own painful feelings, darker thoughts and challenging emotions.

    I guess I’m getting tired of the imbalance. Tired of nailing my needs to a cross of self-sacrifice. In truth, I prefer orienting towards the positive, embodying good as best as I can. I love loving life, even if much of that process has to be done in private for me to uphold a certain personal quality. But, man… would I ever like to be able to bring it out more in a way that feels genuinely sustaining and measured in its effect.

    I dunno… I don’t really want to literarily rant about it any more. I suppose I just needed to get that out of my system through words. For those that speak the astrological language, my moon is in Gemini (as is my Chiron for that matter), so I tend to process emotions through either talking or writing. I’m committed to the intention behind this blog, in finding ways to get my inner experiences out through expression, so here it is. As always I appreciate anyone who actually reads this. With this last month of travelling being one of the hardest periods in recent memory regarding communication blocks, I doubly appreciate anyone taking in my mental ramblings with their kindly receptive eyes. Nothing but love to all of you.

    (Editor Aodhan here again: While the personal truth contained within this post remains, the lens of emotion has dissipated quite a bit since the writing. I might not exactly feel the way I did while scribbling it out, but I still wanted to honor what was being experienced and expressed by that past version of me by giving it its place in this blog-space. I am still undertaking my journey through Costa Rica, and glad for it. I’ll touch in on that more so in an upcoming post, but I will say this experience is absolutely proving to be positive and beneficial to my personal development.)

  • Sun at the Mountain Top

    Nov 20: I’ve spent the last few days in a city called Nicoya, not too far from where my previous workaway was, getting some writing done and chilling in my own space. Got a simple little airbnb close by to all the good stuff, run by a very sweet host and neighbored next to a really awesome guy (out here living his dream!) It’s all be pretty low key and easy going, but I did have a fairly special experience today. The host at the previous workaway pointed me in the direction of a half hour hike up a small mountain just a little bit out of the city. At the top was promised a big cross (of the christian variety) and a stellar view.

    I had postponed setting off towards it due to rain during the morning, but the dry air I thought I was venturing into turned to rain once again when I started up the trail. It never really got to be much more than a sprinkle, which was actually something of a blessing. Costa Rica is on the cusp of entering into dry season and man, when that sun is out it is hot. I actually got a bit burned today from it. So the rain cooled things down for the hike quite nicely.

    Even still, since it was an incline the entire way up I was sweating regardless of the rain. I had set a kind of spiritual intention for this hike, seeing as how the local ticos viewed it as something somewhat sacred and there being that cross at the end, and I felt the rain actually added a nice element to the proceedings. The waters of heaven mixed with the waters of my earth, cleansing me in a sense for what I would find at the top.

    I found the level of effort required perfect, keeping me breathing heavy throughout, clearing my interior with life rich air as the rain did something similar for my exterior. I kept a steady pace all the way until I reached the cross. It certainly wasn’t anything fancy in its construction. Quite the opposite in fact, made from rusted metal and missing a few pieces. But in this context that didn’t really matter. It’s what the symbol represents that holds the significance, not the nature of its form.

    I meditated next to it for a while, tuning myself into the interpretation of the Christ essence I resonate with. I identify with no religion and take plenty of umbrage with orthodox Christianity. I was actually brought up in a subsystem of christian theology that I could only describe, diplomatically speaking, as dissonant to my own nature. But I have come to deeply appreciate what the Christ image represents, genuinely believing in the energy and essence behind it. I actually felt myself getting somewhat emotional during that little meditation, for reasons meant only for me and whoever or whatever I was tuning into.

    As I felt myself coming to the end of the meditation, the sky began to clear and the sun started shining on me. In esoteric thought, Christ (and all messianic figures) correspond to the sun (the sun of God), it being the energy of the divine’s holy emanation, or that which expresses light, warmth and goodness. A fitting and honestly affirming moment. Numerous names and initials has been inscribed into the cross and I figured I would do the same, etching an A and a C.

    Having accomplished what I set out for, I began to make my way back down. Now that the rain had stopped and the sun was out, countless butterflies were flitting about all over. So many different colors and shapes. An especially large one swooped right past me, its impressive wings colored a vibrant, shimmering blue. Seeing all these lovely little critters only added to the significance of this experience for me, as I had drawn the star card from my tarot deck two days in a row recently, and butterflies are a part of its symbolism. I was feeling so much lighter and more peaceful as I made my way down that mini mountain.

    There was just one more part to this process I felt I needed to fulfill. One of Costa RIca’s oldest churches is in the heart of Nicoya, and I felt compelled to sit in there for a time in order to ground my experience. In my view (again, not being religious and having been negatively affected by religion), there really is something of a hallowed sense in these old churches. I might not subscribe to the exact symbolic arrangements they use or the metaphysical interpretations they follow, but a resonant spiritual energy permeates these places. So many people have expressed their honor and devotion towards God, or spirit or source or whatever, in places like that, and when you really open yourself up to it, can you ever feel it. It’s like a highly charged stillness. I let myself flow with the space for a while, giving thanks and praise and sharing some of what I had received at the cross on the mountain with the church. Once I felt the process was complete, I quietly got up and left.

    I have to admit I was hesitant to share this story; mindful of potentially diminishing the experience I had in any way by allowing my ego to exploit it for its own benefit. I find it incredibly distasteful when people boast of their spiritual experiences. But it is part of my journey here in Costa Rica, and a piece of my own story, of which the telling is the entire purpose of this blog. Since I’ll have written this out long before posting it, perhaps I will opt to omit it after all. I suppose you’ll know if you’re reading it now. In any case, I encourage all of you to find similar types of moments in your life, where you allow yourself to tune into and receive the blessing of something greater. Something sublime. The touch of the divine.