February 2007: Life Lessons from the Beach

Greetings,

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Written and published by: Dr. Toby Silverton & Dr. Bev McLagan

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Personal Reflections

What we learned on winter vacation…

It felt like we’d stepped off the planet. There is something about removing yourself from everything familiar, from every reminder of your “old” life, that let’s you see yourself without all the filters. It’s like shaking off everything you know, everything you are, its like removing glasses that have steamed up from life, it’s that moment when the lights come on in a theatre or you drive out of the fog bank. We decided it’s not a luxury but a necessity to “drop off the planet” on a regular basis to achieve this sense of renewal.

Sun, sand, and cell phones just don’t go together. We did it! A one month vacation with no cell phone, no calendar of any kind, and no computer, not even emails. However, it’s very clear, the rest of the world seriously needs our help! There we were soaking up paradise while all around us others were lying on the beach talking on cell phones, text messaging, or checking their PDAs. Perhaps these unwitting victims of technology were “playing hooky” from the office so needed to appear connected, but no these were vacationers all the way. We admit we listened to conversations to confirm this. We only have one thing to say, to all our clients who now vacation without their technology-fix, we stand up and applaud you. Spread the word…power down folks, life’s too short, way too short.

If you stop looking for problems, Life gives you real warning signs. This is important life learning here folks ‘cause it is far easier to pay attention to the real warning signs of life than to worry about what may be. Take the “Stinging Jellyfish, painful stings” sign that popped up overnight on the beach, thank you we will avoid these. How ‘bout the guy running up the beach with his arm dripping in blood after having half a hand bitten off by…ok no one knows for sure, but the opinion of a lifeguard in the know was eel or shark. Got it, don’t swim beyond the breakwater, got it. Then there was the Tsunami warning one quiet evening. There it was, proving my theory that sometimes life lets you know when to be worried. They even told you when to be very very worried…when the sirens went off it was time to move to higher ground. Roger that! We all go through difficult times in life when we worry about anything and everything just because, but it’s a lot easier if we wait for the flare. And, just so you know, there were no earthquakes, we were not on any “watch list”, and the plane didn’t crash.

If it’s raining but your still lying on the beach life’s ok. So one week was kind of dull and showery but we’re talking tropical showers. Everyone kept apologizing, “oh we wish we had better weather for you”. What could be better? It’s 80 degrees and we’re in shorts and t-shirts! Hey, it’s all relative.

Every vacation comes with a reality check. On the day we were to fly home we were in a horribly grumbly mood for obvious end of holiday reasons. In a mad dash to buy an extra piece of luggage (yes, ok, we did overshop!) we ran straight out of the hotel only to be confronted by a parade. This parade, however, was made up of groups of peace protestors: kids for peace, women for peace, educators for peace, and signs, lots and lots of signs “bring our troops home”.Talk about life being humbling. Perspective is good, even if it did feel like we had time travelled back to the sixties!

…and a few other random thoughts from the beach…  

• one bride on the beach too many and it begins to look like some weird Disney film
• you can never have too many designer stores
• it’s ok to have baggage..as long as it’s big enough!
• sometimes sand just gets on your beach towel and there’s nothing you can do about it
• there are no perfect bodies
• there is no “should” when you are trying to decide between the pool and the beach
• vacation means doing nothing
• you can go home again…but damn it’s tough.

Until next month, Embrace Life!

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