Morning Thoughts---Wanting

It is rainy and cold up here and has been almost since the day I arrived. Yesterday I was so cold that I spent half the day in bed reading, just to keep warm. I am looking forward to being back in Mexico.  I don't know how people can stand months and months of weather like this and I was told that this isn't even their winter yet.  No more trips to Portland in the wintertime for me. I hope I can keep that promise to myself. This is the second winter that I have been up here. I was here two winters ago when my family went to India and again this winter. Maybe they are burned out of going to India now. I hope so.

The only part of my life in Mexico that bothers me is the distance to my family. I know that this is a real problem for many women, especially if they have grandchildren. Talking to your loved ones on skype isn't the same as sharing your life with them.

It is a good thing that Guadalajara is less than an hour away from Ajijic and if I get too lonely I can fly back here in a day. This is why I would not want to move to countries further south. I know that a lot of expats are moving to Ecuador. I get comments raving about living there but it is so much further south than Mexico and the small towns that would interest me are even more difficult to get in and out of. Besides, I love living in Ajijic. If things are good, why go searching for something else? And my favorite trite saying: If it works, don't FIX it!......

Maybe some people just get restless and that is why they go searching for greener pastures. I grew up with a father like that. Always moving from one place to another. He thought things would be better in a new town or a new job..... They weren't!  I learned from what he didn't learn. Life is mostly an inside job. Yes, the weather in Mexico is so much nicer than here. Yes, life is easier and less expensive there. Yes, people seem friendlier and more relaxed.  (Of course the expats are friendlier and more relaxed. They no longer have to work!) But in the end, what goes on inside our heads and hearts is what matters the most.

I love to read. I have read several books written by people who had been in prison for years, tortured and in isolation for months at a time. Most of these writers were able to transcend prison. They found peace and happiness in those terrible situations. I am now reading a book about India and how very poor people are able to overcome their difficult situations. I think that spirituality is part of the attraction my son and his wife have for India. They visit the holy places. For a brief period of time, they are out of their very demanding lives where they constantly have to strive, just to maintain.

I was thinking about the word WANTING the other day. Wanting seems to be what our lives are mostly about. Longing, desiring, are two other good words for it. Reaching out to the next thing in our lives. Maybe when we no longer want, we are ready to die. Or maybe when we no longer want, we are enlightened.  I would like to experience this longing inside of me as a fullness, not an emptiness. Nothing has to be put in that longing space. It is proof that I am alive. It is good.

My current game with myself is to accept all that wanting inside of me and not attach it to anything outside of me. Just accept and love the wanting. This is not easy, especially in the States where we are constantly bombarded by the outside world, advertising better lives if we buy more...... Want this. Want that, they scream at us from television, radio, computers, billboards. From all directions.

 Christmas season brings out the wanting in us but mostly directs it to material things. We are told in subtle (and not so subtle) ways to prove that we love people by giving expensive Christmas gifts.  The more expensive the gift, the greater your love. This is a lie. The more you love, the greater the proof of it.  Love is a feeling and not a thing.

I believe that when I can accept that wanting, longing, desiring, and not attach it to anything outside of myself, I will be much happier.  I want; therefore I live......  I want to be in warm, sunny Mexico but I can be happy here. I keep telling myself that. In the meantime, I am going back to bed to get warm again.