“Leave the door open for the unknown, the door into the dark.”
— Rebecca Solnit
It’s a Sunday afternoon on Salt Spring Island, and from where I’m sitting, all I can see are trees.
I woke to rain, to the steady drumming of showers on this canvas-walled yurt, and it hasn’t let up all day. It has only varied in strength – at times falling lightly and at other times with more urgency, as though somewhere in the atmosphere an invisible hand is turning the lever of a faucet, playing with the pressure of the downpour.
And so I sit here at my desk watching the rain fall, watching it dance on the branches of the pine and fir and cedar trees surrounding the yurt. They rise forty, fifty feet into the air, nearly filling the whole frame of my window. To glimpse their crowns against the sky, to regain a sense of space and perspective, I have to lean forward; I have to look up.
But even then, it’s impossible to glimpse any sign of a world beyond the woods.
Even then, I cannot see beyond the trees.
About six weeks ago, I hit a stretch of low days here on Salt Spring.
The kind of days when the solitude feels more like isolation; days when you can’t quite picture how where you are now connects with where you’re trying to go.
One night, I sat journaling by the fire. It was pelting down then, too, and I paused often to listen to the gentle thud of rain on my roof. But I journaled long enough to write my way into a realization – that this was not the first time I had been surrounded by a vista-limiting forest. This was not the first time I had faltered in my faith to keep walking.
If you’ve been reading this blog for a few months (for which I thank you!), you might remember the solo trek I did through Turkey last fall – a 22-day, 350-km route called the Evliya Çelebi Way.
You might also remember reading about my second-to-last day on the trail – or what proved to be the weirdest, hardest day of my journey. It was difficult because I soon found myself in a maze-like, mountaintop network of forest roads. Every road was lined with a wall of trees that stretched twenty, thirty feet above me, and again, permitted not a single vista as to where I was headed.
Because I’d wandered from the trail so badly, the directions in my guidebook were rendered all but meaningless, and I had only a $7 compass from Istanbul to guide me. As I would write the next day, it was “the most lost” I had been yet.
But the day was also incredibly weird because, for the first time that entire trek, I wasn’t angry about being lost. I wasn’t frustrated or furious or fearful. In a way, I actually felt a strange amount of peace, as I continued to follow the needle of my compass whichever way it pointed northwest. It took me left and right, up and down, north and south, but the road kept aiming northwest just enough that I did indeed feel like I was going in the right direction, even if I didn’t know it.
There was only a single question I kept asking:
Where am I going to end up?
I could tell then, even while I was still very much in the heart of the forest, that what I was experiencing was a perfect analogy for other less literal journeys – that sometimes all we can do when we’re on a path that gives no guarantee of where it’s taking us, is walk.
I’ve felt a similar tension here in the yurt these last couple of months. I’ve never been happier in my day-to-day existence – splitting kindling, making a fire, picking fresh mint from my yard for tea – but it’s hard to quiet that part of my mind forever focused on the future. It’s the same tension we face so many times throughout life – this tension between being and becoming, between loving where we are right now without losing sight of where we want to be down the road.
Although my heart is okay with the uncertainty, my head tells me I need answers – that people are starting to ask where I’m going next, and with less than a month to go, I still don’t know. I know only that I’m headed home to Virginia for a brief visit – but beyond that, while potential projects could take me to as many as three continents by the end of the year, none have been confirmed. Again I find myself asking – when the trees finally give way and the vista re-opens, where am I going to end up?
Two days after I moved to Salt Spring, my neighbor Hanna sent me a photo she’d taken from their porch that morning. Their house sits on a little bluff above the yurt, and the photo shows what’s impossible to see from here on the ground – it shows that the surrounding forest eventually gives way to rolling hills tumbling towards the southern end of the island.
It shows the world beyond the woods.
The photo will always mean a great deal to me, for without realizing it, Hanna gave me the very thing I need the most right now – she gave me a vista. Context. The big picture.
She gave me courage to keep walking, and I hope that wherever this finds you in life right now – if you too are surrounded by your own towering forest, be it literal or figurative – that it might be of some reassurance to you as well.
That even when we don’t feel ready for what’s next, the only call is to keep walking.
Even when our destination is unclear, we keep walking.
Even at our most lost. Even at our most alone.
Keep walking.
It’s like you read my mind. I’ve been in this place, too, where I feel like I’m in the woods and can’t quite see where I’m headed. I was just thinking this morning about writing – knowing that will likely shake things out a bit for me. Thank you for writing this, for sharing your yurt journey. I so wanted to visit you, but didn’t get my stuff together in time. I am planning a trip to the Pacific Northwest hopefully in the next month or so. Enjoy your rest time in Virginia! xoxo
I’m so happy to hear this resonated with you, Margi – truth be told, it was one of the hardest pieces I’ve written in a while, and it was just as hard to finally press the ‘publish’ button, so I’m really grateful it met you where you’re at right now! And you absolutely *must* keep me posted on your PNW plans – I will definitely be passing through Seattle again at the end of June, and there’s a chance I might be sticking around longer as well. It would be amazing to see you there! Sending lots of love your way. xoxo
Oh Candace! How understand! How I too am plagued by that tension between where I am and where I want to be and how (HOW IN THE HELL???) will I walk that road between (how, indeed, do I even find the road?). So this, right here, speaks to me in so many ways: “days when you can’t quite picture how where you are now connects with where you’re trying to go.” Just keeping walking my friend, and I will too. XO
Kim, one day we are going to be back in the same place, having these conversations in person, and nothing in the world will make me happier in that moment – but until then, I just have to say YES – “that road between” truly is the most difficult part of it all, isn’t it? And I’m not sure about you, but my time on these walking pilgrimages has definitely given me some peace with the tension of the in-between – and yet there are still days when I really just want to reach the metaphorical cathedral in life and know where the journey has led. Thank you for being such an encouragement to me on this path! XO
I always love reading your posts, but this one spoke to me very clearly today. I too have been feeling a little lost lately. I have the goal in mind, and I am progressing towards it. I admit though that some days it feels like I will never get there. The struggle between planning for the future while enjoying the now is real. I’m learning to do it, but we all have our moments where the balance is hard to find. Thanks for sharing. 🙂
Amber, I have those days all the time! Days when it feels like everything I’m trying to create and make happen is never going to materialize – but every now and then, and perhaps you’ve experienced these as well, there are days when the woods finally do part and you get a brief but glorious vista letting you know everything *is* connecting and leading towards something real. Slowly but surely, I’m learning to love both days – and reading the book I quoted in the beginning of this post is helping a great deal….it’s called “A Field Guide to Getting Lost” by Rebecca Solnit, and I can’t recommend it enough. I’ll be thinking of you as you continue on your path!
I’ve connected quite a lot with your recent posts. I agree, you need to keep walking when things are so uncertain. Perhaps but in those moments of darkness are we able to see the break in the clouds. Although if one doesn’t know where they are going, can they truly be lost (Turkish hillsides excluded of course)? I find it so interesting, we as people are always so focused on where our future is going, that we forget about the present sometimes and lament time moving so quickly (myself included). Thanks for sharing your courage to keep walking in these moments of uncertainty and change.
As always, the eerie connections continue 🙂 So I tried very hard to keep this post clear and concise, but if I could have continued it, I wanted to share the story of where I ended up that second-to-last day on the trail….I shared briefly about it in one of my earlier posts about the Evliya Celebi Way, but essentially it turned out to be my most beautiful homestay yet – with a wonderful family living in a one-room house without electricity and lit only by a kerosene lamp. And as I sat in their house that night, reflecting on how if I hadn’t been “lost” that day I would never have met them, it occurred to me that we’re only lost when there’s somewhere specific we’re trying to be – which is, of course, the exact thought you just shared! So I’ve been trying to keep that in mind these last few weeks as well – that if I let go of my specific goals for the future and focus only on what I need to be doing today, perhaps this sensation of being ‘lost’ in life will feel a little less strong. I’m not sure, but I’m trying to put it into practice. Thinking of you as you walk through your own transitions right now, Anwar!
I’ve sworn off eerie coincidences, it is bad for my diet. I am always impressed that you manage such thorough responses to folks, I hope people manage to read them. I don’t know if we can always “let go” so easily, so if you manage to do that, I would be interested to know how! I always feel that I am trying to “know” what is coming next. How both liberating and somber such clairvoyance would be. You struck it so well there though, those times when we are “lost” we often find ourselves exactly where we need to be. It would be impossible to imagine life another way and often we would lament this loss even if at the prior time it was wanted we prayed for. I look forward to reading about your future plans and also your exercises in letting go as well.
So beautiful and wonderful. I often feel lost – caught in the tension between doing what I love (to create a better world) and wanting to feed my soul (by traveling). But this line ‘sometimes all we can do when we’re on a path that gives no guarantee of where it’s taking us, is walk’ — so beautiful. so critical.
thank you for the reminder.
Thank you, Aurora! I’m so happy to hear that this connected with where you’re at in life right now – know I’m sending lots of good walking-through-uncertainty vibes your way this week 🙂
Ok, so this might be my all-time favorite post to date… because it speaks so much to me. It is so honest and relatable. Wow, Candace. Wow. Thanks for sharing. Keep on walking… and inspiring.
Ahhh, Emilime! I can’t even tell you how wonderful it is to hear from you here – and even more so to know that this resonates you…I have a feeling we have much to catch up on! Thinking of you so much, my love, and I can’t wait ’til our paths cross again.
Superbly Written…
Thanks, Ganesh! I’m glad to hear you enjoyed the story.
Hey, Candace, greetings from India! it is wonderful to read the story of your travel and to see the paintings… Everyday, I keep checking if any new blogpost has come up… and today, I felt this excitement when I saw that you had a new post! And coincidentally, it help me see my own situation, as if it was the perfect medicine… thanks for writing, keep it up.. With lots of good wishes, Swagatika
Hello, Swagatika! I always enjoy hearing from people here, but especially from India 🙂 May I ask whereabouts you’re from? I also just took a moment to look at your own site and absolutely love your pencil sketches and drawings! Do you have any more of them? I’m not sure if you’re signed up to the newsletter or not, but I’ve been featuring a sketch artist every month from around the world and I would so love to feature you at one point as well, if you’re interested at all – my email is [email protected], if you’d like to get in touch there!
An all-time favorite quote, that I’ve finally been able to listen to recently:
“If the path be beautiful, let us not question where it leads.”
🙂
That one is going in my journal right now – thanks so much for sharing it, Brittany 🙂 Hope all is very well in Africa! Are you still in Malawi?
Thought you might like it, quote-master! Your site has surely given ME a few good ones for the journal!
Zambia now – Inside South Luangwa National Park, where I saw a leopard and a warthog facing off over a desirable piece of muddy earth!
Enjoy your last few weeks in Canadia!
I love the way you write and pose questions and even solutions. 🙂 Surely everyone in the world, regardless of age, can relate to this post. I am 59 y.o. and my husband retires at the end of this week. I have looked forward to that day as marking the chance to travel wherever and however we want. But life is never that straight forward. Our children are grown but now we have to think of our elderly parents and their needs. I am always wanting to fast forward things and am itching to see the world outside the trees. Your post has reminded me to slow down and enjoy the path through the forest, knowing that the road will open up and go other places eventually.
Thank you so much, Jan! I’m honored to think that this story resonated with you as well – it took some time to find the right words for it, but I ultimately felt like it was something that I wanted to share here, in case it related to anyone else’s situation…and I’m delighted to hear that it seems to have done just that 🙂 I also so understand what you said about life never being so straightforward – and I wonder if you’ve read Rebecca Solnit’s book, “A Field Guide to Getting Lost”? In it, she talks about how the things we desire, the things that are far off, as soon as we do attain them, something else is just going to appear on our horizon for us to long after – and that seems to connect quite well with what you’re saying…about how you’ve waited for this day of retirement (congratulations to your husband, by the way!), but now there are other goals to reach towards. I’ll be thinking of you both through this transition – and thank you as always for reading!
Candace, it has been a genuine pleasure again to accompany you on one of your “mind strolls” again! I think it feels a bit like watching a wee plant growing and blossoming in front of your eyes… 🙂
I think you already mentioned a quite important thing: view. Imagine the moment you climb a hill. You may sit there, enjoy the vista and marvel at all the things you would not be able to see from the valley or how these things even changed when viewed from there. But you may also sit there and try to spot new peaks to climb and try to figure out a decent route to get there. However, this may have changed the moment you descend the hill and may look entirely different the moment you stand at the foot of the other mountain. So we should focus on the view instead of “pathfinding”. Not meant to say we should wander aimlessly, but maybe that we should trust “the compass within”!?
Following might be a nice “guide” as well:
Have patience with everything unresolved in your heart and to try to love the questions themselves as if they were locked rooms or books written in a very foreign language. Don’t search for the answers, which could not be given to you now, because you would not be able to live them. And the point is, to live everything. Live the questions now. Perhaps then, someday far in the future, you will gradually, without even noticing it, live your way into the answer.
~ Rainer Maria Rilke in “Letters to a Young Poet”
I turned it into a wee post(card) earlier this year in case you fancy a look: http://www.coffeestainedjournal.com/2014/03/questions-rainer-maria-rilke/
I could once again apologize for an “inappropriately long comment” but I simply close with a “Thank You” for the expression “journaling by the fire” and a “Good Luck” in discovering that “compass within”… 🙂
Oliver, I almost wrote that I can’t believe you just shared that Rilke quote – but then again, I should know by now that it’s really no surprise at all! I have loved and adored that quote forever – I have it on a card that my mother gave me ten years ago this past April, right after I didn’t get accepted to a certain university, and was filled with uncertainty about where life would lead after high school (which felt like such a big concern at the time! 🙂 But that card has come with me everywhere I’ve gone in the world, and its message has only grown in significance. I’m drawn so strongly to the idea of ‘living’ our questions now, especially as it connects to another quote by Anais Nin about how ‘we live out our confusions until they become clear.’ I love how both quotes talk about ‘living’ things we normally push away in life – living out the questions and the confusion. Because that’s really the only way that true clarity is obtained, isn’t it? There’s peace to be found through surrendering our need for answers and clarity, and slowly I’m learning to become a little more okay with that process of surrender. Thank you *so* much for sharing your thoughts, and I’m thrilled that Rilke’s quote is a significant one for you as well!
Beautiful post as always, Candice. Your musings capture perfectly what I struggle with all the time – wondering where I’m going to end up while trying to remain in the present moment. It’s so difficult!! But I guess I know that if I’m always thinking about the future, life is going to pass me by without me even noticing. And that’s no way to live. So thanks for the reminder. 🙂
I’m thrilled to hear this post resonated with you, Lisa! And please believe me – I am right there with you in trying to strike the right balance between being present in where I am, without losing sight of where I’d like to be in the future. While I am far from living out this balance every day, I’ve come a little closer through the idea of enoughness…through believing that everything I have today (and even everything I am) is enough, and the answers I think I need right now will come about in their own time. Thanks so much for reading, and I’ll be thinking of you as we both aim to live in the here and now!
Thank you once again for your deep thoughts so beautifully put. It’s always a pleasure to know what’s going on in your mind as well as where you are and what you are seeing and experiencing. As Shakespare said “…I would rather entreat thy company’To see the wonders of the world abroad/Than, living dully sluggardized at home…” I’m having such great fun traveling with you as I’m getting older now and don’t travel so much anymore, mainly just locally; but, as I live in the Adirondacks, I am surrounded by great beauty, for which I am very grateful. Keep trekking! ♥
Thank you as always for reading and sharing your insights, Roberta! I feel incredibly blessed to have connected with you here, and it’s always an honor for me to share stories and thoughts and sketches with you. While I haven’t spent much time in the Adirondacks, I’ve heard they’re beautiful, and hope that this spring has given you lots of time for rest and reflection! xo
Thank you for another beautiful post Candace, you have a way of getting to the heart of things in your writing, it’s always a pleasure to read 🙂
Thank you so much, Nikki! That means a lot, and I’m so glad that the stories I share here resonate with you. Thank you for reading 🙂
Love it Candace, I literally, right before I just sat down and read this post I told a family member of mine “Today I just couldn’t be bothered” and they said “Well don’t do anything today” to which I replied “Well I have to, I did nothing yesterday and I know if I don’t keep on going, there is no chance of me getting to where I want to be”. That gap between keeping on keeping on and enjoying the moment is a tough transition to make sometimes, but ever so important too. Cheers for the great read 🙂
Jaryd, I’m thrilled to hear that this post found its way to you right when you needed it! And you couldn’t be more right – I feel that navigating this tension between enjoying where we are while still aiming towards where we want to be is one of life’s greatest challenges…as is finding the courage to keep going between the two. Thanks for sharing a bit of your own experience, and I hope it’s inspired you to keep walking through this transition. I’m right there with you!
Oh how I understand this…having just booked our tickets home, with a million ideas and no actual plan, it seems like I’m setting myself up for disaster. But I have a direction I want to take my life, so I’ll keep just walking in that direction and see where life leads me.
I’m so glad to hear this resonated with you, Carmel, and congrats on booking your flights! Only because I know the journey is just going to continue to unfold and evolve for you and Shawn. And I so, so understand the place you’re in – of having a thousand possibilities floating around and no plan yet set in stone. I’m right there with you! But if this time in the yurt has taught me anything, it’s that that openness definitely doesn’t have to mean we’re heading towards disaster 🙂 I think that sometimes there are plans in life that need a little more time to brew – there are plans and dreams that can’t be rushed, and by giving them the time they need, we’re actually putting ourselves in a better place to make those dreams happen. I’ll be thinking of you guys in these last couple of months of your current journey, and look forward to following along the next stage as well!