LIFE LESSONS

Listening to My Soul’s Fearless Yearning

Because today is all I have — Dancing Elephants Prompt #5

May your choices reflect your hopes not your fears. ~ Nelson Mandela

30 November 2021 — Charlotte, North Carolina

It has been almost a year since I arrived at CLT, with a one-way electronic plane ticket boarding pass scanned to my cell phone, two suitcases, a hiking backpack, my yoga mat, and a sweater.

At the beginning of last year, I decided to leave the U.S., for good. It was time to return home, to Borikén — a land I’d only visited as a child as well as in adulthood, the birthplace of my parents, the home of my ancestors.

Arriving here was one of the biggest decisions of my life. While it is true I did not come as a stranger, moving to another country is nevertheless a huge deal. And when people ask me those common questions:

What has it been like? How are you transitioning to island life?

My reply is always the same, “the easy part was in listening to my heart, to what my soul yearned for all these years…I am home, the rest is secondary.”

The Long Journey

Being a city girl (from Queens, NY), I never would have imagined I’d one day decide to move to Borikén (aka Puerto Rico). As a child, I visited every two years or so with my brothers to visit extended family here. And while that cultural connection was always strong, I never doubted the streets of NYC were my “real” home.

How wrong I was.

As a kid, I knew I wanted to be a pilot. That was decades ago and though I have a few single-engine flight hours under my belt, that dream morphed into many other things.

Working as a Compliance Analyst in the corporate sector allowed me to have a lucrative career, but I felt empty. Since I always knew I wanted to see the world, I figured I’d use some of my hard-earned money from banking to travel.

The story is a really long one. I’ll save the details, if you’d like, you can check it out here. In it, I talk about how I left corporate to become a travel blogger, and now I freelance write, among other things. To recap an abbreviated version of my story:

• My heart never was in banking — so I quit
• My heart was always searching — so I traveled
• My heart never was full living in the U.S. — so I left

35 countries later, I finally realized all those years of trekking to other continents, seeking new adventures, I was looking for me. I was trying to figure out where I belonged in this world.

In January 2021, after three weeks in wondrous Tanzania (where I heard the whispers of my ancestors), and after having other experiences (a dream with a deceased cousin, as well as sensing a deceased aunt), I realized what my soul needed.

It needed to come home, to Borikén.

This was the gift I was given: Mama Africa brought me to Her Bosom so that I would know I needed to return to Madre Borikén. It was via that route my soul began to understand what my heart had been feeling my entire life. Indeed, I have zero doubt, I was destined to return home long before my physical birth.

Today, I am 54 years young (tomorrow I will celebrate another born-day).

It has taken a long journey for me to begin to comprehend that matters of the heart must never be ignored. And because tomorrow is not guaranteed, today (every ‘today’ that I am alive) is the perfect time to listen to my heart.

Here, I’d like to borrow the words of a fellow author.

To quote Dr. Gabriella Korosi:

…Our heart is everything. It means love, joy, and life. Our hearts are a true miracle. Our hearts beat faster when we see a loved one.

Each breath that I take in Borikén is a reminder of the love I have for Her. It reminds me to continue to nurture Her and Her (my) people. The miracle of having returned home is something for which I am forever grateful.

Shout out of appreciation to a bunch on this platform who’ve given my heart a reason to smile: Vidya Sury, Collecting Smiles, Omy, Arturo Dominguez, Juanita Ellingson, Fanae-5, MSML, Leah Njoki, Allison Wiltz, Mario López-Goicoechea, Hotse Langeraar, Sharing Randomly, Sam Finlayson, Nancy Blackman, MASF, Chiara Bottino, Yana Bostongirl, Johnny Silvercloud, Dr. Preeti Singh, Dr Mehmet Yildiz, Elephant Journal, Laura M. Quainoo, Mike Lewis

P.S. I almost forgot the initial prompt query — the word “heart” en español is corazón.