Inspiration
Articles to inspire authentic living on the topics of resilience, spirituality, and self-growth with touches of storytelling, depth, and humor.
You can browse themes below
Do you want to explore other resources? Check my favorite books and podcasts
The Wake Up Call
Technology has great advantages. Being woken up every morning by a voice-controlled speaker seems like one of the Jetson episodes I used to watch as a kid. Alexa turns off an alarm every morning and half asleep, we have to try to make her understand that we are not ready to wake up yet and we need more time.
“Alexa, wake me up in five minutes,” the instructions sound very clear in one’s mind but they come up as a non-sense slurp of words that all of the algorithms put together by Amazon can’t come close to decipher.
Instructions are usually repeated several times until Alexa finally understands, which means that by repetition we have awaken ourselves from deep sleep. The alarm usually goes off five minutes later, and five minutes after that in an endless story. In a way, I miss the snooze button on a conventional alarm clock. Just one hand was enough to shut the alarm and guarantee a later reminder.
Being a night owl most of my life, I usually despise waking up in the morning. Fortunately, I also suffer from the 20th century’s disease called “obsession with productivity,” so after only two tries I am out of bed and ready to seize the day. However, I have thinking lately of the importance of wake up calls, not necessarily as it pertains to voice-controlled speakers but mostly about life events that shake us to our roots and kick us out of our dormant state as a bucket of cold water. When we remain apathetic and paralyzed by life’s circumstances, what does it take us to wake up? What makes us answer the call?
The Waiting Room
It was scheduled to be a routine visit, a yearly check-up that fortunately proved that things were clear and well. I could not shook the mild anxiety that always invades me when having to go back. You would think that having grown between hospitals while following my workaholic-doctor parents would make it easier. It has not. I never liked hospitals.
This one, although beautiful and full of cheerful, kind staff, had been by far the hardest to visit. Seating in the waiting room, seeing kids battling cancer, some without a leg, without hair, in wheelchairs or walking with their chemo medicine hanging from a stand makes my stomach hurt. Then there are the parents, who have to remain calm for their kids, pretending life goes on as usual despite scary diagnosis. Nothing makes me suffer more that a hurting child and a broken-hearted parent that swallows their suffering for the sake of their kid’s hope. I can be a rock for so many things, but not for that.
Owning Our Wingspan
As a child I tended to be one of the biggest girls of my class. When the nuns at school insisted we walked on a line by height order, I always knew my place was about three spots from the end of the line. I hit puberty too early, so at ten I had almost reached my current, average height of 5’ 5”. Looking older than what I was became the norm. In fact, when I was twelve years-old people assumed my sister and I were twins when in reality she is five years older.
Being naturally shy, I did not like the attention. Adults will comment how much I was growing, as if I had any responsibility on it. So I came out with a solution to my desire to become invisible: slouching. Bending my upper back, moving my neck forward actually made me look a few inches shorter. What I did not anticipate is how that was going to damage my posture. But becoming somewhat invisible seemed more important at the moment. As a consequence, It has taken me so many years of constant workouts and yoga to improve my stance slightly.
As I was scanning old photographs recently, I realized how much older than my friends I looked back then. Seeing it with the perspective that maturity gives, I could not find a reason why did it matter so much then. Why did I try to look smaller then? What did I try to become invisible? Why being higher than my friends did even bothered me?
The place where all dreams come true
When I was fifteen I discovered that sometimes life showers us with gifts that might come in an unrecognizable wrapper.
I was a - maybe unusual - serious teenager. Great student, president of the Student Government, was already studying painting so I could become the artist I wanted to be. I was basically a good, responsible girl. I don’t mean it in an arrogant way because the truth is that I was so mature that I feel I never got to experience what I was suppose to live during the precious years of adolescence. That was actually my handicap.
Stargazing was one of my favorite pastimes those days. Every night I would stay for hours in the window with my binoculars learning the name of the constellations with the help of an Astronomy book my mom had bought. Soon after I started learning about the stories that originated the stars’ names. That is how my obsession with Greek Mythology started.
The Heroic Gardener
Nonno Mario was the first and one of the most important storytellers of my life. He taught me to play domino and chess and whenever he stayed for lunch or dinner I refused to eat so that we could stay at the table while he fed me long after everyone had left. It was our alone time. Afterwards, inevitable, came the stories.
Wishing upon a dandelion
It was a casual Spring afternoon. My son and I went for a walk around the neighborhood. He was wearing his Batman t-shirt because, what can I say? He likes super heroes.
Soon after, we started seeing many dandelions on the side of the road, a collection of yellow flowers growing everywhere. Occasionally he would grab some and placed them on a bag we were carrying for no other reason that to collect items. It didn’t take long for him to concentrate on grabbing dandelion seed heads, those delicate white globes of exposed seeds that had long been believed to contain the power of granting wishes.
My son, with his superhero shirt, started running holding a bunch of them in his hands, the passing breeze breaking each globe into tiny speckles of seeds that flew in the air. It looked magical, and my son’s laugh was the perfect soundtrack for the moment. Once he was left with only stems in his hands, we set to find more. Luckily for us, dandelions are stubborn weeds that grows everywhere.
I love myself and other truths worth learning
One of my goals as a parent has always been to raise kids with healthy self-esteem. Our daughter Isa taught me that we can perfectly love ourselves and accept us with our greatest parts and our areas of improvements without arrogance. When she was four-years-old I found her in front of the mirror looking at herself and saying "I love myself, I love myself.." It was not an affirmation, but rather a casual comment of someone who holds a truth between her hands. That was an enlightening moment for me that made me reflect on my own self-esteem.
Thirteen years later, I found her four-year-old bother, Leo, playing with his toy cars. He was recreating imaginary conversations between the three cars he had in his hands when I heard him say, "I am very smart and I am very good at drawing."
As parents we are bound to make tons of mistakes. It is unavoidable. Today, however, I realized the self esteem lesson is coming across clearly. Or maybe it is the fact that they are both Leos (like in the zodiac sign). Who knows?
Anatomy of Kite Flying
During the following days, our son asked constantly if we could go outside to play with that flying macaw. We made an effort to understand to fly it better. As I had the reel in my hand trying to explain my four-year-old how we could increase our success rate at the matter, I realized flying a kite is not very different than learning how to live. What can a kite shows us about life?
Living NOW, while we can
Yes, there is not much we can control about our current pandemic situation. But what we can control is what happens inside. At the moment, so many plans are on hold, which feels like a hammer shattering the armature of planners and control freaks. Maybe you don’t fit that characteristics, but you are upset about the vacation you cancelled or then one you still don’t know you will be able to take in the Summer. The world has clicked on the Pause button and we can’t decide when Play will be available. But that is the future and the future is uncertain right now (and it usually is anyways), so what are we left with?
Pinocchio and The Whale
There is no shame on admitting that since a very young age until these days I have always been a fan of Disney stories. I ate the whole plot of the world is difficult but the good ones always triumph, the evil lose and there is always a happily ever after. Before you judge me too strongly, let me clarify that I have grown enough to understand that life is not a Disney story and there are lots of exceptions to the plot we were made to believe.
The world at this exact moment does not look like a fairy tale. I doubt a pandemic will ever make it to a children’s movie. I certainly hope not, unless it is a science fiction story. So how come that in the middle of this unforeseen chaos my mind is going to one of the most iconic children’s stories?
The Forced Vacation
These are challenging times, there is no doubt. At the beginning we make plans, as we always do, to try to deal with this unexpected hand of card we have being dealt. We make a list of projects we will do while we are stuck at home that includes fixing things that were not working at home, remodeling, spring cleaning, rearranging. Maybe we will set apart some time for that bubble bath we always intend to take but never have the time to. We will meditate, write, check on friends, cook as a family, play board games, scan old photos, reread old letters, finish that book that has been seating on our night stand.
After a few days, the real crisis start.
Love in Times of Cholera and Other Pandemics
Fast forward to 2020, while we are dealing with the paranoia of the COVID-19, we have all be instructed to stop touching, shaking hands and kissing altogether, as well as to avoid gatherings as much as possible. There is so much fear! We certainly need to take measures to avoid the spread of the disease as much as possible, but I can’t deny that I am even more worried for what it is fostering in our society,