The Year of Door Closures

At first glance, 2020 has been the year of door closures. But you know what they say, “another opens.”

Plans and ideas of what life would look like have continually changed, some becoming completely irrelevant by now.

My friend Anna and I took a trip to southern Utah a few days ago to visit some parks. Finding ourselves both jobless and fed up with life indoors, we planned the trip out in a matter of days and quickly executed. It was something that wouldn’t have otherwise gone down with such haste.

Hiking and surrounded by the dramatic landscapes of earth-red cliffs at Zion Park, I asked her, “What would your life look like right now if COVID had never happened?”

I pondered the same. I would be in New York, at the same job, grinding, and probably still in my long-distance relationship. Maybe I would’ve stayed in New York for years to come. Or maybe I would’ve eventually moved back to Utah to be with my boyfriend. It was a decision I was always mulling over in the back of my mind. So much so that my existence in New York often felt threatened by a potential move. New York or Utah? I lived between two worlds.

Then COVID happened and I was laid-off overnight. This was my chance to leap into the other path — back to Utah where my partner patiently awaited me. “It’s like the world is bringing you back to me,” he said, after I excitedly told him I was returning for an undetermined amount of time. It was romantic, and finally, that nagging question of where I should live seemed to find an answer.

“I have a feeling my life is about to really change,” I predicted to my friend Jess as I packed a suitcase. It just felt so obvious at the time. Being back in Utah would bring my partner and I closer together, and I wouldn’t want to leave again. I was being led to build a permanent life out west. This was the easy path. So I thought.

Rewind to a couple weeks earlier.

I’m sitting at McCarren Park in Greenpoint after work, basking in the much-needed sunshine after a long New York winter. I’m talking to Jess on the phone and contemplating whether I should fully commit to the city or move back to Salt Lake to basically settle down and start a family. It was all being offered to me if I just returned. But New York was my dream, the place I’d longed to be in since I was a kid. And finally, I was there, in a job that I liked, finding my footing in that crazy city. “Salt Lake would be the easy choice,” I told her. “But I’m not usually an easy choice type of person.”

Maybe there never is an easy choice. Maybe each choice comes with as many blessings as it does predicaments. Maybe you think you’re choosing the easy path but really by doing so you create the pain of denying your potential. Or perhaps, all paths — temporary and shifting, eventually lead towards a deeper knowing of yourself and of life.

When I lost my job and decided to fly back to Salt Lake, I thought the universe was kindly throwing me a bone and letting me take the easy route — giving me a break from the incessant striving towards my full potential, the embodiment of New York.

Nah. It was yet another opportunity to grow. Salt Lake was not easy. COVID has not been easy. But it forced me to look at unhealed parts of myself and to bring tenderness to them. So in that respect, life was loving to me.

My relationship did not make it, and that felt like a door closing. A path no longer available.

I arrived back in the Bay Area yesterday — back at my mom’s, a square one that was always waiting for me.

Amidst all the fall outs, I can’t help but to come up with another plan, another idea of what life could be. Each redirection feels permanent as it happens, but I should know by now they never are.

This time the plan is so vague maybe it can’t really be called a plan. A hope, a desire that burns deep within my chest. The taste of freedom. Sun-drenched skin and sea-washed hair. Words and creativity.

Ties to places have come undone. The open road emerges past closed doors.

She cannot be contained.

xxGabriela

This Etch in Time

Hi friends,
Happy May! We made it through April, and I know for many of us it wasn’t easy. The weather has significantly improved in Salt Lake, renewing me with more vitality and optimism than before (thank God). Spring is lush and almost fully actualized. Signs of forward movement are popping up here and there. Businesses in the city have started to re-open, and work in NY may start sooner than I anticipated…
While a lot still remains uncertain, I can’t help but feel that a potential ending to this chapter is near? Which makes me hesitate at the thought of returning to life as normal. Some of the hesitation regards anxieties about public health, some of it is about the flawed normalcy of our society, and some is about losing my personal freedom over time.
I feel extremely blessed for the outpouring of time I received through this quarantine. I know that everybody’s situation was different. Some might’ve been busier than normal, some continued to work, some had families to take care of, etc. But I am grateful to have received that which I was so deeply needing — rest, and renewal, time to be and play and go inwards, inwards, and more inwards. I excavated some old wounds, brought some healing upon them, spent time doodling, writing and making art for myself.
I felt a freedom similar to that of summers as a kid. Months that seemed to stretch on forever, days fading into one another with no sense of order. It’s ironic that within all the limits of this quarantine the word that keeps resonating with me is freedom.
How I was able to find that within the portals of the mind. By letting go of expectations, demands, and through lots of self-compassion.
And as terrifying as it sometimes was to be left with myself, to work through anxiety, and trauma from the past, I will hold what came out of this tenderly.
I just wanted to share a token of gratitude for this strange chapter and what it taught me. For allowing myself to melt into one day and the next, for being messy and untethered, for crying tears of joy, for marveling at the beauty of a tree on my walks around the neighborhood.
This etch in time has bound itself to me forever, like the scars on my legs; each with a story to tell.
xxGabriela

		
	

The Pause

Hi, friends:

The world has forced many of us to pause. And in that pause I found the observer in me. I couldn’t grasp the right words to process all of this, nor the energy. I’ve felt like a quiet, doe-eyed kid, watching the TV cross legged in the living room, feeling powerless over all the happenings. Yet, I can’t deny the strength in the desire to surrender.

Yesterday morning we woke up to a 5.7 earthquake in Salt Lake City—the largest since 1992. There was no way of predicting this, no real preparation on our part, but luckily, we were fine. It was beautiful seeing how the neighbors came together outside, checking in with one another, helping turn the gas off in various homes.

By noon that day, I was officially laid off from work.

The day mirrored much of what the world has been like lately; utterly unpredictable, shocking, messy, yet so intensely beautiful, too. I see our society being more considerate of one another and nature rebuilding. Scrolling through the internet I have witnessed so many find and share the humor in all of this, which to me is something that makes the human spirit so innately beautiful. Could you imagine if our species could not laugh?

Though life has never felt so uncertain, I can also say that between the sadness and the overwhelm, I have also experienced a profound sense of aliveness and peace. I am loving everything and everyone harder and remembering what matters. Simplifying. Letting go of the noise that tells us our value is rooted in our productivity, in our success, in what we have, and the amount of money we make.

I am at peace here in the mountains; next to my love, closer to nature, closer to God. Remembering to listen more.

I’m wishing you all comfort and solace during these times. You are not alone.

Love,

Gabriela

I’m here for you if you want to talk. Also, I’m doing a 21 day abundance meditation challenge – let me know if you want to join and I’ll share the deets.