Making ourselves whole – reflections of a beginner’s mind
Contemplating the mountains before me, I breathe a deep breath of gratitude. I remind myself how lucky I am to be here, now, in this moment – with the freedom to choose how to show up for the day ahead.
The choice isn’t always easy, though. Because the world is full of contradictions. And so are we.
To feel joy, we need to know what it’s like to be sad. To feel hope, we need to experience despair. To feel connected and alive, we need to know what it’s like to feel depleted and alone. Getting things right means sometimes getting things wrong.
Creation, and destruction.
Growth, and decline.
Gentle, and tough.
These are not opposites: together they make us whole.
But do we ever allow all the parts of ourselves to be seen and heard? We’re more often constrained by our fear of what might happen if we do.
My friends at The Happy Startup School understand this well. For their community of purpose-driven entrepreneurs, founders
Laurence McCahill and Carlos Saba create and foster safe spaces for people to simply be themselves. They bring people together in a way few others do.
Just last week, I experienced the sheer magic of this at their annual 7-day Alptitude event in the French Alps, where I live. Every year since 2016, I’ve joined them to hold a safe space for founders and leaders to be inspired, express themselves freely, and be truly heard.
The mountains all around open our hearts and minds to new ways of seeing, listening, being.
They invite us to be agile, but grounded. Solid, but not fixed. To find stillness in our movement. And to allow ourselves to change.
As participant Judy Andrews put it…
I left home to return to myself.
To who I am.
To what I know.
To what I have to give.
And what I learnt?
Something I tell others all the time.
I already have what it takes.
Speaking for myself, Alptitude reconnects me to my inner child: the one who wants to dance wildly and sing at the top of my voice. It feeds my beginner’s mind by giving me the sense of being at the start of something purposeful and creative. And it fills me with the joy of learning and growth.
I leave feeling more human, and a lot happier for it. And I’m pretty sure my fellow Alptituders do too.
We all need moments, places and people that remind us what truly matters; that reconnect us to nature, to each other and to ourselves. My daily mountain walk and heartwarming events like Alptitude, are some of mine.
Where in your life do you feel most alive? Do you go there often enough?
With love from the mountain,
Sally-Anne
