Being here, now.

I've been reading a lot of books by wise people (it's awesome to be in a relationship with a person who enjoys reading and has more or less the same reading interests). I've been doing a lot of yoga. And for all the stress of the city and apartment hunting and are-we-or-aren't-we really making any money, I am, with more and more regularity, able to come around to the same conclusion: it's already all good.

My early life was driven by goals, which I think is generally good. But when I got to college, this "achieve" mindset started to fade away. I certainly wasn't lazy or even less motivated, I just found my motivation getting directed toward other things. When I started to travel, my whole definition of success changed. It no longer had anything to do with money or anything else traditionally called "successful", and everything to do with who I am and what I experience.

But it's easy to get caught up in the idea of the brevity of life, and over the years I've caught myself thinking, crap, what is THIS, what am I doing, shouldn't I be here or there or somewhere else by now? I have to admit that has happened a few times in Buenos Aires, particularly as I took my first-ever job as a waitress-turned-bartender/cashier.

I'm a sharp cookie. Some people probably thought I'd become a lawyer or a senator or a journalist. I've thought that myself once or twice. So when, at the age of 29, you start working for $3 an hour cleaning up after people when they spill their drinks, it happens that you question your life choices.

But I've been reading lots of books. And doing lots of yoga. And I find myself resting with more and more regularity in the truth: there is nothing I have to be or do. I already Am.

A couple of years ago, I thought to myself how much I wished I'd learned to bartend in college because it looked like so much fun. And now I'm doing it! And it IS fun!

Being human, I might wake up tomorrow and write the exact opposite of what I've written right here, at which point you should direct me back to this, and to the books, and to the yoga, and then I will remember again. We're on a great path: the chiropractic office is growing, Vemma is growing, yoga classes are growing, and we're all kinds of excited for the stuff we're dreaming up.

Damn you, Buenos Aires. You are perfect just the way you are, and we are perfect here with you.