My name is Linda Cooper, at age 52, I made the choice to dismantle my entire life. With the ending of my marriage, quitting my job, selling my home and all of my furniture, I packed my personal belongings into nine totes, loaded up my SUV, pulled out of my driveway and headed beyond the edge of my known reality.
My journey began with letting go of the familiar and entering into the dark abyss of the unknown. With pen and journal in hand, I wrote my way across Canada, travelled to South Africa, to Italy, to India, to Iqaluit, and the journey continues…
I was not the head of a large corporation, I did not leave a six figure income with a bank account overflowing with money to provide a safety net. I was a 52 year old woman, sitting in a cubicle, feeling on the edge, who was dissatisfied with her life, and who needed to summon up the courage to take the risks necessary to change.
I needed to learn who I was, stripped of a conditioned existence. I needed to find and live my own truth, and to create meaning for my life. I had come to the edge of my known self and of my known life, and I had to take a leap outside of my comfort zone which had become most uncomfortable.
Change begins at the edge …. What are you at the edge of?
Note #1: Life as a Tree
I have always admired trees. They know their place within the big circle of life. From a tiny seed, they grow strong roots within the earth and stretch their branches up to the sky. Rooted in their purpose in this ecosystem, they reach out, touch and sustain other life forms, each with their own unique life expression, each contributing to the whole. They are a living breathing expression of the natural law of life. They ...
Note #2: What are you at the edge of?
What are you at the edge of? Feeling at your wit’s end, the last straw, that nagging feeling inside that will not give you a moment’s peace. That thing that keeps you up at night, or sends you looking in the medicine cabinet for relief. Are you able to identify what that is? It’s a feeling, stemming from a thought, rooted in a circumstance, simmering in a perspective or perception. That feeling of uncertainty, has ...
Note #3: How do I begin to unravel my life?
The seed of discontent did not lie in specifics, but rather in a general discontent that manifest in almost every area of my life. A low grade depression, low enough in the background to allow me to function day to day, to even smile and laugh, but high enough to signal on the inside, I was in some type of distress. To the outside world, I looked good. I had a husband, owned a home, ...
Note #4: The search for self
How far back must I search, in my endeavour to understand and unravel from the patterns and conditioning through which I have lived my life? The experiences imprinted on me which lead to my choices? To my parents? My ancestors? My cultural heritage? Or do I start at the fundamental root of life naturally expressed as a human? My mind, filled with thoughts, perceptions, interpretations from gathered experiences; a collection of data, has been running ...
Note #5: Taking the leap
Sitting in front of my excel spreadsheet and looking over my finances, I felt a sinking feeling inside. How in the world am I going to make the changes and live the life I desire, when not even that is crystal clear at this point, and finances do not dictate a vast amount of time to sit back and figure it all out! If I based my next decisions, in fact if I based any ...