Taking the Cottages with Me

When my husband and I have a particularly long stint of accomplishment we celebrate with a staycation at the Waimea Plantation Cottages. We do this usually about twice a year, and I cannot tell you how important and refreshing this two to three day staycation is. It is our way of telling ourselves – “You did it! Congratulations!”

It wasn’t always like this. We didn’t take the time to celebrate. Instead, we’d just take a short breath and rush onto our next thing. We’ve learned through six intense years of building and running a full-time Center that these short stops in-between are the best thing we can do for ourselves and the Center. Everything will be waiting for us when we return. It isn’t easy to let go when you run your own business, but if you want your business to truly succeed without your burnout, you better learn how. At least, this is the truth for us.

This morning, our last day at the cottages, we were sipping our coffee, looking out at the ocean and I said, “We need to take the cottages with us.” My husband replied, “What does that look like?”

Good question. I’m sure we all feel it after taking a vacation of any kind. We don’t want to just go back to business as usual. As for me, I live in one of the most beautiful places in the world. You’d look at my life and think, she is on vacation. Wherever you are, there you are. I can still get tied up in the stress of living. However, I’m learning and I can say that this last adventure we took of training and running a marathon and rehearsing and performing a one-woman show – a six month process, along with the everyday business of running the Center, has proven that we better “take the cottages back with us.”

What this looks like to me is that along with a strong vision for what’s next, a great amount of organization, there must be delegation. Not just delegation to others, but delegation to the Power of the Universe that is the wind beneath our wings. There is a surrender that happens when you’ve done all you know is yours to do. This surrender is the letting go to the Universal Power that runs the show behind and beneath it all. It does it through us, as us, if we will not strain against it and resist it. We are the directors of the course, we set the sails in the direction we want to go, the Universe provides the power the wind. There is a big difference.

This knowing allows me to take the cottages back with me to Kapaa. It will take that daily reminder of what I’m capable of and how the Universe supports me. It will take surrender, delegation and the knowing that my life is part of a bigger picture, a piece of a larger matrix of energy that is only asking for my belief, focus and faith in it. “Do your part, Rita, and the Universe will take you the rest of the way.”