kaua'i sunset

As our time here on Kaua’i winds down, we’re busy enjoying the sun, spending time with friends and eating as many mangos and fresh avocados and ahi as we can. Seriously. I’m going to miss the food.

But! At the same time, our next adventure is on the horizon and it’s really, really exciting. You’ll be hearing lots more about it as we get closer to it (and of course, while we’re on it), but for now, here’s a sneak peek.

One year. A van. Two bikes, climbing gear and running shoes. A couple of computers, add me and Bracken and voila! Adventure.

We arrive back on the mainland (in UT) at the end of May. There, we’ll look for a van that will fit us, our stuff and our budget, kit it out and then drive it to Boulder. (Or, we’ll figure a way to Boulder and find a van there… thus begins the year of living in the moment.)

We’ll hang out in Boulder seeing friends, catching up, attending Ignite Boulder 11 (yay!) and working (probably a lot). We’ll then set out early August for a family reunion in Idaho and from there… onward.

We’ll be working some, climbing a lot, biking a good chunk and running many miles over this next year. We’ve been talking about this for a few years now (well before we got engaged) and it’s finally happening. I’m still trying to wrap my head around it… I’m excited and petrified all at once. I’m learning the art of transition quickly.

Here’s to adventure! Hope to see you on the road, at the crag and on the trail.

Aloha!

watching the sunset on ke'e beach

Most days I enjoy the journey, getting excited about what’s happening around me and within me. Other days, it’s a little bit harder.

My life seems to be changing and evolving so quickly these days. I wanted to take a moment and share the latest.

expand outdoors
The biggest things that’s been going on is I’m in the middle of building a new business for my life coaching practice. Many of you know I’ve been taking classes since arriving in Hawaii and expect to graduate with a certification in June.

It’s been a lot of work. Classes are international, and are conducted via phone, so we’ll have students from Shanghai, Arizona, Sydney, New Jersey, Paris, New Dehli and Texas on a call together. We’re required to take over 130 hours of classes, so I’ve been on the phone a lot!

One of the requirements of graduation is to coach five people for three months (or 12 sessions each). I’ve loved this part. Truly loved it. Which tells me I’ve chosen the right career path, as this will be the main component of my practice. I coach via phone (or skype for International clients), which allows me (and them) to be anywhere in the world. Great flexibility as Bracken and I plan to do a lot of traveling over the next year.

Speaking of Bracken, along with his regular work load, he designed my logo, my website and then built my website over the past few weeks. It’s still a work-in-progress, but it’s live and I love it.

You can check out the website here: www.expandoutdoors.com.

There’s also a blog I’m starting for Expand Outdoors. You can sign up via RSS, or submit your email address through the site and receive updates via email. It’s a pretty sweet feature. Topics will center around fitness, the outdoors, coaching, personal development and the like, yet hopefully will stay personal and engaging. Let me know what you think.

This blog (ameliacarolyn) will likely evolve a bit as I figure out how to write for two and what each will be focused on (as I’ve got a lot of posts about the outdoors here). I’m hoping to experiment and have a little fun with this one, so stay tuned and let me know how you like it.

waiting for the tsunami that wasn't

life in hawaii

Hawaii is still really good. It’s not home, but it’s good. I miss a lot of things about Colorado. I want to make the most of my time here and really enjoy it… but I find myself missing my friends and the trails and the air more and more. The time here, however, has been perfect at this particular time in my life. It is providing a new space to begin to explore my career and build my practice without the distractions of “how-I-used-to-do-things.”

I strayed a bit (okay, a lot) on my yoga commitment. It became too much for me and I wasn’t enjoying it six days a week. So I relaxed (to not doing any) for a few months and am now getting back into it in a more realistic fashion. A few times a week (1-3), along with running and of course, surfing.

I will miss the ocean tons when we return to the mainland.

And that’s it for now. Just a quick stop on the merry-go-round and now off we go.

dawn patrol

This is my first visit to Hawaii, and I couldn’t be happier that instead of vacationing here for a week or so, it’s for a long stay. We plan to live here for six months to work, to live, to learn and to experience something new.

It’s so easy for me to stay where it’s comfortable. The familiar routine of morning coffee. Familiar trails. A community of good friends. When Bracken suggested we move here, I committed pretty immediately. It sounded so wonderful (I mean, duh… who wouldn’t want to live in Hawaii?). But more than wonderful and exotic and fortunate to have the means and time to do so, it seemed to fit. There was an aspect that just felt right to me.

So, after a couple of months packing up our stuff after our wedding, a hectic week moving it all into a storage unit, and a week of car trouble where we weren’t sure we were going to make our original flights and feeling pretty displaced and defeated before we’d begun, we made it.

For me, I want to experience something new. I want to slow down and find a way to simply be without my own expectations, interests and familiar routines getting in the way. I finally feel ready to move forward on a new career path (one I’ve been searching for and thinking about for over a year now). And I’m excited to begin that process of recognizing and realizing my (newly rediscovered) long-held dream to write and to work with others, helping them realize their own goals and dreams.

I don’t know how I know, but I know this is the place to do it. I imagine it’s similar to the feeling I had when I moved out to Colorado way back when. Somehow I knew I wouldn’t leave it for a long time, and I knew it was the right place for me. And today, I know Kaua’i has something planned for me. Maybe it’s something big. Or maybe it’s simply planting new seeds of growth for something far in my future.

I’ve learned to trust my intuition a little better lately, and although it’s not going to be without challenges and difficult moments, I feel a quiet calm in my presence here. A quiet and peace that feels good and right.

I’ve tried to keep my expectations and plans open as to what I want to do here and leave here with, but I do have a few things I know, and want to share them here, with you, my dear readers.

• I plan on doing a LOT of yoga. I want to strengthen and heal my body and to meditate and find deeper peace and knowledge of myself.
• I will be spending a lot of time working towards a certification as a life coach. This is the first step on my new career path and one that is amazingly exciting for me to think about and finally delve into.
• I plan on spending a lot of time swimming in the ocean and learning how to surf. It’s a childhood dream to be a surfer and while I have no expectation on surfing large waves, I do want to be comfortable in the water, with a board, standing up.
• I want to write. A lot. I have a vision of this blog with a lot more updates, observations and stories, as well as writing for a few bigger projects I have in mind. Stay tuned.
• And finally, I want to slow down. I want to find a deeper sense of consciousness in my choices and an awareness in the world around me.

Over breakfast this morning, I looked around and got the feeling as though I’d been plucked out of my own life and dropped in on an entirely new world. It’s a good thing, it’s a scary thing and it’s an entirely unknown thing. And I’m ready.