My Love Affair with the Ocean

Since this podcast originally aired, I actually DID make the move down to the beach. And it WAS hard, but worth it. 

I have a love affair with the ocean, but I would bet that you also have a dream, or goal that you've put off for al long time for various reasons. The question this episode asks is - What are you waiting for? 

Transcript

Laura Wakefield: 0:00

I could sit for hours and hours doing nothing but watching the tide roll in and out and listening to the sounds of ocean waves breaking against the shore. It's the most peaceful sound in the world, in my opinion. Welcome to The Joyful icity Podcast. I'm your host, Laura Wakefield. Some of my earliest memories are of the beach. I grew up in Southern California, and I spent a great deal of my young childhood splashing in the waves, collecting seashells, building sandcastles, and pestering the sand crabs and seagulls. Those were happy times, innocent and unaware of the troubles ahead. I am grateful for those carefree beach baby days, for the sunlight and the salt air that wrapped itself around that little girl, and made her smile. The ocean became a part of me then, in a deeply spiritual way. It came to represent playfulness and a time when I lived with an unguarded heart. It came to symbolize the purest essence of myself in a joyful state of being, thus beginning my lifelong love affair with the sea.

Laura Wakefield: 1:26

I don't live near the beach currently, and I miss it. Life is busy and time and money are often in short supply, so vacations can be hard to come by. But it is only at the ocean that I finally fully exhale, like a primal instinct to open and relax and return to my true nature. The ocean draws me to it. It calls me with a familiar comforting voice that assures me always that everything is going to turn out okay. At the beach, I'm not the girl working on her tan. I'm the one out in the water, completely immersing in the sensory experience of it, allowing it to fill my heart and soothe my soul. There, the stresses of daily life wash away with the tide. My body and mind and spirit become aligned with nature, and breathing feels free and easy. The gentle breeze kisses the skin, and the sounds of the waves crashing close to the shore are comforting. Both random and consistent. Powerful, yet calming. Untamed, and vibrantly full of life, but still welcoming and peaceful too.

Laura Wakefield: 2:49

You may have noticed if you visit my website that ocean imagery is all over my pages. in both words and pictures. Because to me, the ocean symbolizes peace, joy, retreat, and healing. The wisdom found pondering in quiet moments on the sand. Gifts given to me that I hope to share with others. To me, the ocean, in essence, is a place of love where my inner child laughs and plays. And that... Above all is where its true magic and beauty is found. My family moved away from the beach when I was about 10. And since that time, I've probably said a million times that the ocean is my happy place. And I've probably said half a million times that I intend to move back there someday. Someday. I've talked about it. I've even gone as far as looking up houses on Zillow and really dreaming and planning and creating a vision of it in my mind. I chose an area. I've narrowed that down. It's become a vibrant hope and wish in my mind to someday move to the beach. Everyone that knows me well has always known this, that someday mom was going to move to the beach. But there's this little problem with the word someday. It isn't real. It's not an actual calendar date. It's not anything that you can pin down. It doesn't have a time frame or an urgency to it. And if you're not careful, sometimes someday can become never. It's very undefined. And so until you start actually taking real steps toward any dream or goal or thought or wish or hope or idea, someday actually doesn't mean anything.

Laura Wakefield: 5:07

In the past few years, I've had some things happen in my life that have kind of shaken me up. Some high school classmates and some family members have passed away. And really deeply reminded me that our time here on earth will end for all of us and that we don't know when that will be. And so putting things off for many of the people that I care about, I've watched their dreams die with them. And there's a part of me deep inside that has started to really take that to heart and realize that I don't want that to be my story. And that if there's a place out there that brings me so much peace, so much inspiration, so much joy, why shouldn't I move there now?

Laura Wakefield: 6:06

I was having a conversation with somebody a couple of months ago and we were talking about this topic and how sometimes you need to just ask yourself the question, when there's something that you've been putting on the shelf for a long time, what are you waiting for? Like what specifically exactly are you waiting for? What magical turn of events or financial things or what is it that will finally get you off the fence and get you to do that thing that you've been dreaming of and talking about for a long time? And sometimes there's actual reasons and you can spell them out and you can say, well, when X, Y, Z happens, then I'm going to do this. And that makes sense because then you've got something in your mind that's concrete. But for me, when I asked myself that question a few months ago, what are you waiting for? Like you keep waiting for this time in the future, but what is it that's going to make it finally time? And you know what? I couldn't come up with an answer. I didn't know. And then I started thinking, well, what will it be like when you do make it happen? And wow, the blessings and rewards were innumerable.

Laura Wakefield: 7:30

Part of this move down to the beach will involve downsizing my house, which will simplify my life quite a bit so that I won't have to work so many side jobs. And I'll have a little bit more time to put toward more of my passions in life. So not only will I be near the ocean, I'll have more time to devote to writing and to this podcast and to the things that light me up and bring me joy and maybe can offer some hope and healing for other people as well. Part of moving down there is an internal thing that for various reasons, I myself have never really chosen where I lived. Now, I've lived in wonderful places, so I don't mean that as a complaint because I've had a wonderful life. But there's a part of me at 55 in midlife that finds that kind of exciting that I can choose for myself something really major in my life like that, like where I'm going to live. Part of it's going to be financial. Part of it's going to be spiritual. Part of it's going to be physical change. And change can sometimes feel a little daunting. So when I think about actually making the move, it's one thing to fantasize about it and to think about it. But the actual practical parts of making the move kind of get a little bit overwhelming. You have to get your house ready to sell. You have to sell it. Then you have to actually move all your stuff, sort through everything you have, decide what's coming, what's not coming. You have to work out details for your children in the new location. You need to get moved down there where you don't know anybody and make new friends and find a new dentist. And all of the details of it can sometimes feel so huge that it's almost easier to stay put where you are.

Laura Wakefield: 9:24

And this holds, by the way, I'm talking about any dream or goal. I'm using my example of moving to the beach, but these ideas apply to anything that we dream about and talk about and put off for someday. That sometimes the reason we don't move forward is just because it seems kind of hard. But think about that for a minute. Is there anything that's worth doing, that has great reward that comes with it, that doesn't come with certain level of challenge? Like an Olympian would never stand on the podium without an awful lot of effort. You don't get a diploma without a lot of effort. You don't have a successful relationship without a lot of effort. There's really nothing that we can do in our lives that's really worth much at all that doesn't have a certain price that you have to pay for it. But the idea is that the price is worth the reward. But there's a lot of different factors like that that can kind of keep us stuck putting things off for some day. And something has been building inside of me, leading me toward the beach for a long time now. So I finally took an actionable step and I went down there a few couple months ago and I actually narrowed it down even further to a particular school district, which has me just in a couple of different spots so that when I look on line now, I really know what houses I'm looking at. And all of a sudden this thing took on a momentum. It's funny what happens when you finally take a step. You take it out of your mind and into an actual behavior, how quickly things start to line up. If you're doing the right thing, the universe will just, all of a sudden, the doors just start flying open. But it's not going to force your blessings upon you. It's going to wait until you are ready to just start walking in faith and taking a couple little baby steps. And then the next thing you know, if you are in line with the true destiny of your life, the pathway begins to unfold in front of you rather quickly. It's kind of amazing.

Laura Wakefield: 11:36

So all of a sudden, I'm actively getting my house ready to sell. We've been painting. I've had the handyman here. I've already been sort of pre-marketing it. I'm a realtor, so I'll be listing it myself. And I have a lot of resources for that. So I'm fortunate in that regard. And I've found a realtor down in Florida, and this is happening. Within the next few months, as soon as all the ducks line up in a row, I'm going to be downsizing to the beach. That thing that I've been putting off for some day, that day... is today. It's happening now. And I'm in the midst of kind of the hard part of it right now. But you know what I'm finding? Is it all that anxiety that I had about the hard part actually has been replaced with excitement of what's to come. It's not going to be easy. I know that. There's going to be some lonely times, some anxious times, some stressful times, a lot of new things, a lot of change, a lot to adjust to, a lot to absorb. But it feels deep down in my soul like the right thing to do and that I shouldn't wait to make this happen.

Laura Wakefield: 12:46

So I will keep you posted on my move down to the beach. But the main purpose of this podcast today isn't so much to talk about my personal circumstance, although that's the backdrop for the message, but more just the reminder to not put off the things that bring us joy. Because you never know. You don't know how much time you have. And even if you don't pass away young, you don't know what your health is going to do, what your finances are going to do, what your relationship status is going to be. The details of your life could go much differently than you expect. So all the ways that you're planning something for some unknown, undefined time in the future, it may not go like that. So whenever possible, it's better to take hold of our dreams as soon as possible and make them into realities, because this is your life that you're living. I say that a lot in my writing and in my speaking that this is your life and we want to make sure that we're fully living it.

Laura Wakefield: 13:53

Now for you, it may not mean a move. It may not mean something that dramatic. It could be something as simple as I've always wanted to take an art class, but I've never found time to do it. Make the time, whatever it takes, that thing you've always dreamed of, that hope and that wish that just won't go away. I'm not talking about a passing fancy. I'm talking about that thing that won't let you go. It's important. It's a part of your story. It's meant to be part of your story, but it won't be unless you consciously write it in and make it so. You're the author of that story. And we forget that sometimes and we allow life to just kind of happen to us rather than take control and make it happen the way that we know that we want it to. And we have to be willing to pay the price of the decisions that we make. But the question that turned the tide, so to speak, for me was what are you waiting for? And if you come up with some really solid reasons, then factor those in and put them in your calendar. Still make an actionable plan. But often you might be surprised to realize that there's no answer to that at all. All those things you think, well, I couldn't possibly, I can't, that's too big, that's too whatever, that's just excuses. If you really, really want this thing, What are you waiting for?

Laura Wakefield: 15:36

We really can do and have and be everything that calls to our heart if we're willing to do what is required of us to make that happen. So that's my prayer for everyone today, is to have the courage to just start taking the steps, even if they're small. If your dream is that art class, get online and research local art studios. That one step, just that one thing, because I think you'll be surprised when you do that, that you discover, oh my goodness, there is an art studio in my town. And oh wow, it's really not quite as expensive as I thought it was. And they hold it on Thursday nights. Maybe I actually can do that. And the next thing you know, when you start to take the steps, you're taking the art class. Whereas if you just sat around thinking about it, you could find yourself still in that place in 10 years, not having taken an art class. And think of all the art... and self-expression and beauty that wasn't created because you didn't take that first step. So I would encourage you all to just take a step towards something that's calling to your heart, because that really is what makes us feel alive. And those soul passions are really the source of some of our greatest joy. Have a wonderful day, everybody. Thank you for joining me today on The Joy fulicity podcast. If you enjoyed this episode, please like and share and come follow me on all major social media sites at Joy fulicity or on my website, joyfulicity.com. You can follow the link in the description for this episode to all of the places that we can connect. Have a great day, everybody. And remember, dare to dream, plan to play, live to learn.