Why Costa Rica? Why The Jungle?
A Journey To The Heart is where I am today. I have been on a life long journey as I am sure, we all have been. Like many it takes some pretty big nudges to fully step into our heart and to acknowledge what is beautiful within ourselves. Like many we all struggle with that beauty and many times all we see are the cracks. I am reaching out to share what I have learned and that is, the cracks are the windows to help us see through to our breaking open, to our rebirthing, and our chance to love again. These are the first steps to how we can find our heart and the foot prints that turn into a blueprint for us to find our way back to ourselves and our own heart, our first true love!
I arrived in Costa Rica for the second time since deciding to deep dive into the true essence of me. Like the first time, the breaking open of the cracks that were surfacing while at home in Canada fully emerged. I love this place and arriving back in Nosara last Friday after a five month journey in opening up my shoppe I was able to feel what HOME means to me. Not only do I feel Nosara brings a sense of home to me in my life but it brings me back to the home in my heart in such a large way.
I first came to Nosara one year ago and was in the not knowing what to expect. I was nudged by a feeling that Catie Fenn and Catherine Cowan had created something so magical and so beautiful that I knew there would be no turning back for me. These two lovelies have created the most perfect and safest retreat that brings a small group of women together to do some massive growing, healing and some clear intention setting. I have met the most amazing and courageous woman on this retreat (TWICE). Catie and Catherine created the most beautiful container to hold us in as they share their hearts in order for us to be able to look at our hearts. This sharing gently guides us to look through a lense of pure love and pure joy.
My first Journey To The Heart was this time last year and I felt called to join because I knew there was something big waiting for me here in Nosara. It was confirmed to me last year as Catie came into my life to help me with coaching and to help me find the path I knew I was so destined to be on that this was the place I needed to be. I was frightened at first to be looking so closely inside myself and knew that the changes I needed to make is all it would take for me to fully step into the true essence of me. I also knew my father had me as it fell on the 40th anniversary of his passing and his whispers were gentle yet strong. I am a girl of signs and this was one of them. Actually the first sign was Catie having a full retreat only to let me know one month before there was a cancellation and the retreat was mine if I wanted it. WELL, I wanted it!!
I joined the retreat, booked some extra time here in Nosara and went on a journey that would alter my life forever.
The retreat opened up pieces of me that had been locked away for almost my entire life. I was able to connect with my inner child in such a big way here in the jungle of Nosara. Through my schooling at Transformational Arts College I had done lots of inner child work. What happened here in Nosara was different. My little Patrice never showed up in the past the way she showed up in Nosara. I broke open on the jungle floor for what seemed like a lifetime as Catie held me and guided me through the lifetime that had shackled me for far too long.
I was healing pieces of myself that I did not realize was needing healing. I was coming to a huge awareness that I needed to feel love that was missing in my life from a very young age and for so many years to follow. I could never have given myself that type of unconditional love let alone receive it if it weren’t for the 2 amazing souls that created such a beautiful container. I had been so closed off from the hurt of my childhood in order to protect the pieces that had survived. I had been so hurt by the pieces that had survived I closed off almost all of me by wearing armour that was far too heavy to carry. This armour I had carried almost my entire life was way too much for my adult, let alone a little girl, a teenager and a young woman just wanting to create a life far away from the memories of the world I was born into and never quite belonged in (at least not the one I found myself in). Well today I am working hard at creating the world I do belong in.
In my twenties I found a place to put my heart by trying to put a new family together with my now ex and his two daughters. I put my life into this new heart, this new family and to eventually have our own two children to build a beautiful loving family that I had believed I deserved and that they deserved. I was creating a new heart to only find out I was wrong. You cannot give birth to a new heart because you can only rebirth your own. You cannot find a place for your heart as it already has a place of its own. This is what brought me back to Costa Rica this year.
Last year this retreat gave me the ability to believe I can go home and build a place for not only myself but for others who would soon find me. On our last deep session last year Catie and Catherine kicked my butt sending me home with a plan. Their love, their faith and their light gave me the confidence and motivation to figure it all out. I knew I wasn’t going home with their blueprint however I knew there needed to be something very similar to what they were inviting me to look at. Well the universe had the blueprint already and presented it to me just over a month after leaving Costa Rica. The love, the magic and the jungle truly does follow you home and continues to share the gifts that was bestowed on us. Through this past year I am so proud to say that every one of us from last years retreat has grown and created so much after returning home. Some of us are leading retreats of our own, upleveling in so many other ways, showing up for the hard work, the lessons, moving to New York, stepping into their true essence and one bright light even had a Bodhi Tree baby which was manifested by the whole Wolfpack in Nosara this time last year.
I was sent home with a date of the full moon in January to run my first main event at my retreat home but I had no idea how I was going to pull it together. Correction, I knew I wasn’t pulling it together as I was still scared of stepping out of my comfort zone. The same date Catie and Catherine gave me as my focus I went and did something even bigger. On the Saturday the day before the full moon I did some journaling and on the pages of my journal came the creation of my shoppe. I wasn’t doing the full moon event but I was giving birth to the idea of what would soon be Brighton’s Happy Place. I was hanging up a career to actually step into a life I knew with every fibre of my soul that this is where I was destined to be.
Now five months later I am back in Nosara knowing there is still a piece that was left in the jungle and on that jungle floor. I came back not knowing exactly what was next but I knew it was going to be perfect. Journey To The Heart here I am again and now what is going to crack open? Well tonight during our yoga practice and meditation I met my inner child again and tonight I promised her that I would never forget her and I will never leave her behind. I came home last year after having done a lot of soul work, creating a new life that I forgot my inner child was a part of but I wanted to come back and find my deepest love. ME!! How did I forget the love of my life?
I came on this retreat knowing I was being called back to Nosara for reasons I had not yet discovered. On Sunday we had our first practice on the yoga mat and the reason of my re-entry to this retreat unveiled itself. I broke down with such deep emotions while looking out from the treetops over the Pacific Ocean. I had no idea where it came from but I knew it was needed to be explored. I believed I loved myself and that morning I knew I didn’t. I didn’t know how to truly love myself, nourish myself and for that matter do the healing that I so very much needed. I had some breaking open to do and this is the reason for retreats. Retreats are not just to relax, recharge, rise up or renew. For me retreats are also about breaking open and peeling back the layers of the onion that we never really peel back in fear of what lies beneath. What lies beneath is exactly what I am here to learn in this lifetime. My favourite part of my journey in this lifetime is going deeper with every single opportunity that presents itself.
Today I woke up in the best place after a rough nights sleep. Today I woke up knowing it was time for me to truly honour the girl I worked so hard at protecting. This day feels like it was an awakening for me and one I will remember forever. Today I stepped into my truth as I broke our morning silence on retreat and shared a big piece with Catie on how I was feeling. In the past I had pushed my way through uncomfortable moments to not cause a wave of judgement or shame. Today I loved myself enough to believe that my truth was all I needed, in order for me to learn to be me.
This Journey To The Heart of 2019 has taken on a whole different flavour from last years retreat. Last year was finding my way through a huge shift in my life and about what I was hoping to connect with. This year and this journey is about me finding me and learning to love myself the way I truly deserve to be loved. I know the one person who can truly love me the way I want to be loved today, is me. As we set out on our magical day under the energy of the new moon I was different than the same girl of last year. Our Love Nest tribe of 2019 went on a hike to the waterfall the same waterfall our Wolfpack tribe went on last year. The difference between the two years is that this year I was a whole new person. This year the walk through the jungle and along the river was so much easier and lighter on me than last year. I was not nervous or uncomfortable, I was not unsteady or worried. Instead I was curious and excited to be doing that same walk but with more confidence and love of who I was and where I was going.
How freeing it was to arrive at our waterfall and to be reborn under the cool falls of the water that cascaded over my entire body. How proud I was of myself for jumping off the ledge on the side of the water hole not knowing how I would land just like in life. Not only did I do this once but I jumped three times going higher every time from the side of the cliff playing like I did as a child. Last year I only watched and wished I had a connection to that inner child who had the courage to do anything she had the desire to do. Last year I went home wishing I did that jump. This year I was going home knowing I took the opportunity to love and nourish myself with all the courage of my inner child. This year I stepped into my warrior power and jumped in with both feet.
Well my journey did not end there as we walked along the river bank heading back to our sacred meadow for our quiet walk of reflection and love for the surroundings and of ourselves. This walk gave me the opportunity to truly crack open through a fall that left me with a slow bleed for hours afterwards. This cracking open was in the way of a swollen knee, some bruising, scrapes as well as a hole in my knee. Tonight as I write I realize my fall represented the breaking open and release of what has been peeking through the crack since I first arrived. What will it take for me to love, honour and accept myself? What will it take for me to nourish myself and know when it is time to fill my cup?
Today I am filling my cup and I will do so for the rest of my life. Today something more than just my knee broke open in that jungle and I am so filled with gratitude as my masculine side of my body created room for my feminine side to step up as I love, honour and nurture myself. This morning Catherine and I sat creating a new mantra to bring home, while this afternoon the riverbank created the space. My mantra is just that, giving permission for me to love, honour and nurture myself as I go forward in this journey.
As I have arrived in the energy of the new moon and this new journey I am aware that the jungle once again has altered my life forever.
The crystal sound healing tonight in the Nosara jungle gave me another piece to this healing journey I was on. I spent a lot of the sound healing with tension, stress and trauma releasing going on by way of tremors. As my body took in all the beauty of this sound healing my body was releasing all the stress. Near the end my body literally went through the fall again exactly as I felt on the riverbank, tremors and all. As my knee continued bleeding from 5 hours earlier my heart was opening up in the most heartfelt way. I was in love with the moment and in love with the possibilities of what was still in waiting on this Journey To The Heart. I was so happy that I skipped dinner and pulled the most amazing card spread that was so fitting for my life going forward. My oracle card spread filled my cup and was the perfect closure to a perfect day.
I wish to thank you Catie and Catherine for helping me find your bright lights. You both have been holding this sacred space for me for the past 12 to 18 months. You have safely and lovingly sheltered the cocoon I was in since last year and I believe it is time for this butterfly to emerge. I am so very grateful Nosara is where I am emerging and this will forever be the home I wish to fly back to knowing your presence is always here waiting. You both truly are my soul family! Thank you also to my soul family from both Journeys (wolfpack and love nest) it is with our hearts together we have been able to breakthrough to another best version of ourselves. Thank you for showing me your hearts and allowing me to show mine in this most beautiful and amazing space of the jungles in Costa Rica.