For my first years in Costa Rica I was always a city dweller. Actually, for the first couple years I lived in hotels until I finally rented an apartment in Paseo Colón, a business district of San Jose. I had my travel agency office downstairs and my apartment upstairs, so basically I never really left the office. Then I moved to La Sabana, which was more peaceful, mainly because at that time I separated the office from the living quarters. That was a smart move for my sanity. But it still didn’t really feel like home. One day I was out apartment hunting with my girlfriend who had the notion that she wanted to move to Santo Domingo de Heredia. It is a small pueblo not too far from the city, but far enough. I really didn’t know it that well, other than having passed through from time to time. We drove through a surprisingly nice residential area known as Quizarco and spotted a home for rent. It was a two-story home with a yard, garage…the whole works. I told her to call the number on the sign. She told me I was crazy because the price tag on such a place would be through the roof. I told her it never hurts to try, so we called. And now I call that beautiful house my home. I feel that I have now really found my little paradise. As I sit and write this post, as I do every morning, sitting in my Costa Rica rocker with my cup of Costa Rica’s finest coffee and looking out at an incredible view of the mountains that surround this place, I feel a sense of inner peace. I feel that even though things may not be perfect yet, they are all working themselves out in that direction. Of course, nothing ever arrives at that state, “perfection,” does it? It is all about the process. We are becoming perfect because we were made in the image of the only thing that exists which is perfect, God. It is our role not to fight the process, but to flow with it and, most importantly, enjoy it. When we fight it, or when we try to rush it, we feel stress and that can wreak real havok in our lives if we are not careful. Or we can succumb to the notion that it is unattainable, give up and settle for less than what we are destined for. However, settling will only bring ultimate disappointment and disillusion and maybe even bitter resentment, but certainly not joy or peace. I love Santo Doming. It is such a peaceful and serene place compared to where I lived before. I have everything I need right here. Everything I need to enjoy the process of life, the process of becoming more each day who and what I was created to become. We all need to find our Santo Domingo’s. Places where we can be at peace and find the clarity and awareness that often is obscured by the dust-storms of life. A place where the dust clears and the sun shines and we know deep down inside what we have to do. Then we do it. Right? No questions. No second guessing. Just determined and resolute action that takes us in the direction we are supposed to go……our destiny. I hope you find your Santo Domingo.
Update (2012): Times change as I now live in Perez Zeledon and couldn’t be happier….with the place, that is!
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