"I'm telling you Sun, people look at me and they always see something different. It depends on the how I'm feeling. There are some evenings when I only want to show a small slither of myself, or perhaps I'll put out half of my face and keep the other half shrouded in darkness to create intrigue. And then some nights, I show everything and light up the world below with my radiant happiness."
"Oh Moon, you are so foolish!", laughed the Sun, as it thought of the Moon's stupidity.
"Well, well...", flustered the Moon, "...and just how do you change Sun? You're always burning full and bright. You're the constant, boring ever presence!"
The sun sighed at the foolishness of the moon. "Oh my dear friend. It is I who brings subtle change by my movements. When I am furthest away from the Earth, it is I who brings the long dark, cold of winter and the gloom to the hearts of all people. It is I, who chooses when to usher in the buds of spring and new life, and to bring the joy and hope. It is I, the glorious Sun, who brings the heat of summer, the long, seemingly endless days at the beach, when the hearts of the people begin to dream of far away places. And it is I also, who begins the end of all things by moving slowly away again. I am change!"
The Sun beamed more brightly at that moment, secure in the knowledge that once again, it had beaten the moon. The moon fell silent and decided that coming night it could not show its face, and would keep it hidden behind the clouds. The wind smiled a knowing smile and blew on. It knew that it was only the wind who truly created change. It was the wind that brought the hints and smells of the oceans, the deserts, the mountains, and of far off places, that began the dreams, and that sowed the seeds of change in the hearts of the people. And for those few, those courageous few that dared, the wind touched their hearts, and set their feet to walking their one true path.
The wind blew harder that day and gusted around and about, touching more hearts than usual, such was its joy at knowing that once more, it was stronger than the sun and the moon.
~ ~ ~ ~ ~
Today, I want to write about change, or rather, the change that I am bringing to my own life. For a long time, there is a dream that I have held in my heart, it is a dream that erupts and bursts forth every time that I am sitting on the saddle of a bicycle, pounding my legs up and down, becoming lost in a rhythm of my own making. I've read books by people who have done it, I've seen for myself people out on the road, as I have driven by in a car, wishing more than anything that I could exchange my comfortable air-conditioned environment, for their saddle, and earlier this year, I met someone who was undertaking the very adventure of which I have dreamed. That dream is to make an epic cycle tour of some far off place. The bicycle, the road and me, joined in a trinity of my own making.
Why now? If you believe that a moment will come, when all the stars are in magical alignment, when every single event culminates at exactly the right time and place, creating for you the perfect opportunity, then I'm sorry to inform you that you could not be more wrong. There is never a right time to begin a dream. The time becomes the right time when you choose to make it the right time. You can spend all of your life waiting for the perfect moment to arrive, it never will. There will always be some task that needs to be done, a perceived loyalty to a job that you cannot quit, a commitment to a family member or a friend, you'll tell yourself that you need to save more money first, that you need more preparation time, that you'll do it next year. You won't. This will continue on and on until one day, as you wake up and lie on your bed feeling the old age in your bones, you will know that it is too late, that the moment is gone and has become lost forever. To achieve a dream takes one single moment of... well what exactly?
Foolhardiness, idiocy, stupidity, bravery, courage, and strength. All of these traits combine at a given point in time, at a single moment when your future life hangs in the balance. At that one instant, you have a simple choice to make: do, or do not. What this comes down to is whether you will choose to let your dream go on only ever being a dream, existing only in your mind, or whether you will seize upon the moment, and begin to turn that dream into a living reality. There is no secret, no mystical formula, nothing special that distinguishes those of us who follow our dreams from those that do not. It is a fallacy to believe that we are any different to those that do not pursue their dreams. We are just the people that act, that see the opportunity and take it, because we understand the consequences of not doing so, and we fear to live a life full of what might have been.
Out of no where, an opportunity came to me, and for whatever reason, I was presented with a chance to do something else. I knew the moment that it came, that I would take it. There was no hesitancy, no moment of doubt, no questions that needed to be asked. As with all of life, one thing inevitably leads to another. Imagine for a moment a room with a single door. You can choose to open that door and step through it into whatever that awaits you on the the other side, or you can remain safe and secure within the four walls of the room, looking at the door and always wondering. At the moment that you open the door and take that first step through to the other side, you discover an infinite number of possibilities. Once you step outside, you give yourself the chance for anything to happen. And it does.
After the initial decision was made to leave Costa Rica behind, to say goodbye to these rich shores that have been so good to me, that have given me some of the most amazing and incredible moments of my life, I found that I could at last make another of my dreams a reality. At the beginning of December, I will make a long overdue journey back to England, to visit my family and to catch up with old friends, before I head off again in January, bound for the shores of New Zealand. It will be in New Zealand that I will put into motion my dream of cycle touring. What better place is there for my first foray into this new adventure, than a country that I know well, that has a modern infrastructure, speaks the same language (well mostly), and that offers miles of open roads and some of the most beautiful and stunning scenery on the planet? I personally can think of no where better.
It will not be my first time to New Zealand. I first went for a whistle stop, three week vacation in June 2004, touring both North and South Islands by car. It was my first ever solo venture, a trial run of sorts to test myself and my abilities to travel alone. I returned in January 2007, this time as an international student, enrolled on a degree program at Victoria University of Wellington. I graduated in February 2010, and left New Zealand in April that same year, in pursuit of a different opportunity and dream. New Zealand is in my blood and I am extremely happy to be returning there, this time to see so much more of that amazing country, at the slow pace from a saddle of a bicycle.
The winds of change blow. When they do, it is for you to decide whether to act on their calling, or whether you will let them pass you by. Dreams will always remain dreams unless you seize on the opportunities that come your way. From one opportunity seized, others too will come. This is the law of favourability, as the universe is kind to those that seek to turn their dreams into reality. Once you are out there, walking on a path of your own making, your eyes and heart are truly open to life, and as such, further opportunities will come your way. When the wind blows answer its call, take that step and allow change to wash over you.
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