The angels have send me some interesting assignments in the past couple of weeks.

We’ve been traveling for 2 and a half weeks now. We went on a big family (of 6) vacation to Guadeloupe the week of Thanksgiving. I learned two big things during those 5 days.

Firstly I have to really practice my patience. Have you traveled with 6 people or more? Just getting through security or passport control before entering the airplane feels like taking forever… Deciding where to go or what to eat or what to buy at the store… drives up my blood pressure, because I’m already an anti-shopping kind of person. So having an extended patience tolerance is really essential when traveling with many people. At the same time to keep up the good mood, I had to look at the little things we accomplished and be grateful for experiences we made! For example I got the great opportunity to see my stepdaughter with different eyes. In a risky situation on a hike in a very muddy rainforest, I experienced how responsible she can behave and how much I could trust her to help put us (her, me and the boys) back to safety. I will forever be grateful for this experience and think that this situation changed our relationship for the future.

For 2 of the really only 3 full days of our stay we didn’t have any running water at our little (Airbnb) villa. On the second morning we only had water to take a shower. When we came back in the afternoon there was none. It was back in the morning to take a shower again, but then never came back on before we left at 5am the following day. So, at 4am in the morning on the day of our departure I went swimming in our pool and then put shampoo in my wet hair on the way to the shower…to then have my husband pour a 5l bucket of water over my head and body…

I thought it was kind of fun and really added something to the adventure… I like challenges and at the same time I was reminded that we probably use 10x the amount of water every shower we take and how grateful we should be that we usually have the opportunity to just turn on the shower and have running hot water!

Yesterday I learned that my husband asked for money back because of this ‘inconvenience’ of not having running water. It’s just funny to see how different people can view these ‘situations’. I would have never thought about this because it just ‘gave’ me such a boost of gratitude, and I was so thankful for this reminder that the universe has sent us.

Yesterday evening my boys and I came back to our little (Airbnb) pool house in Mallorca where we’ve been for over a week now and the power was out.

Of course our hosts who live on the same property were not at home and I couldn’t find a fuse box anywhere. We gathered all the candles that we could find and lit them on the kitchen table. We figured out dinner that we didn’t have to cook or warm up…and had a lot of fun…

I was a little concerned about not having heat all night, but figured that we would be warm enough just snuggling closely in one bed (which we’d been doing all week already anyway).

An hour later our hosts came back home and found out that it was just a tripped fuse and fixed it.

I was very thankful for this little reminder to be grateful for having electricity. We take this for granted way too easily that we can just turn a switch and the light, microwave or oven turn on. And that our fridge keeps our food cold and that our electric devices get charged…

It was a good lesson for my chidren too, who are just so used to all these things that make our lives much easier.

This week I also was told in a coaching by my soulbiz sister Anna that I needed to focus more on the things that are already within me and not distract myself by searching on the outside to really live the fullest and happiest life I can.

I think all these reminders or assignments that the unisverse sends me will lead me into the right direction to do so.

With much love and gratitude,

aNNika