This morning I cycled as fast as I could to the cafe in the village to have an “Americano”.

Actually, I had to go to the toilet, but there wasn’t any running water in our tiny studio on the countryside that Dorus and I have rented since a couple of weeks. After I finished my black coffee, without milk ~ in other words: an “Americano” ~ and I went to the restroom, it felt so good to be able to wash my hands with warm running water from the basin tap.

Crappy situation

On days when the sun hides behind the grey, heavy clouds I know I just need to surrender and just deal with this kind of crappy situation: hardly any electricity and no water from the tap unless we use the generator, which charges the devices and starts the water pump, so the toilet can flush and we can take a shower.

Actually, also on sunny days there are some hindrances to get the water running here. Also candles are needed to bring light in the darkness when the electricity falls down. It all means the batteries of the solar panels are really, really weak.

Messy toilet

Things that I have always taken for granted my whole life, have become a luxury lately. Sharing a bathroom with other people is kind of uncomfortable. Especially when the toilet almost flooded the other day and the landlord said it’s because of the tubes that are too narrow to flush toilet paper. So now I know how to prevent this quite embarrassing situation.

It brought me back to my time when I was in Costa Rica and stayed with a family to immerse myself in the Costa Rican culture and each time I used their toilet, I had to remember not to flush any paper or I would end up with a messy toilet…

Comfort zone

When I cycled back home on the rustic, Mediterranean countryside, where many house holds have solar panels, I was wondering why am I doing this. What was it again why I decided to make this change, moving to this new island that brings me quite out of my comfort zone?

Triggers

Is it the founder of the beautiful Ibizan ecological center — we are grateful to have lived here, in Casita Verde — who claims to love and preserve our endangered planet, but actually only loves himself and his image? His ugly behavior has certainly got things into motion. In fact, it triggered us to take this new step and move to Ibiza’s big sister, Mallorca, to build on our own dreams instead of someone else’s (his).

Our dream is to live a simple and meaningful life in harmony with nature and to start a small sustainable community with a group of caring friends on the countryside where we grow our own food and share what we learn by organizing Sustainable Living courses.

Abundant showers

Is it bad when this dream scares me at times and when I long back to a “proper job” with “proper money” and a “proper home” where I take hot, abundant, showers on chilly mornings ~ or whenever I feel like it ~ and go to a toilet that doesn’t leave a mess?

Working on the realisation of our dreams can be scary and uncomfortable. We might leave our safe occupations, take the leap of faith, and it could be possible we will discover this is not it. It could be it doesn’t work for us. The dream is actually a complex life which feels insecure and uncomfortable.

Trapped

But, we will never know as long as we don’t try. It’s actually a luxury to take the time to try and shape the life we desire, to become a writer, to start a company, to travel the world or to live a self-sufficient life within a green community. Because how often do we feel trapped by the choices we have made, the feeling we don’t have time and we can’t change jobs or leave a career we invested so much in? After all, we lose financial security and the job-title we tend to identify ourselves with.

To leave this “golden cage” behind can take years, until a beloved person suddenly becomes severely ill or a dear friend dies and we realize how damn vulnerable life actually is and that we are given this life to make it meaningful; for ourselves and for others.

We have one life to grab the opportunities which are waiting for us to be seized. We shouldn’t let them pass when we want to make changes in our established lives that lead us to the roads less traveled.

We may have to live with inconveniences to get us there, but it isn’t the end of the world.

No, (click) ➝ an overcrowded refugee camp “Moria” on the greek island Lesbos is. Here 15.000 men, women and children, who escaped war in Syria or the deadly Taliban in Afghanistan, are detained and live during the winter-cold in tents, which are wet inside of the rain, without hardly any medical care, food, water, security and prospects to a better life. It seems, there’s no light at the end of the tunnel.

And one toilet is shared by around hundred people...

I felt embarrassed for my thoughts when I recently read this Dutch story about the miserable situation of these refugees and the political unwillingness to bring humane solutions to the table.

There’s nothing to complain after reading this.

I live in freedom. The air is clean. The trees are untouched. The land is pure and peaceful. There is space to be myself. I wish them exactly the same.

Con Amor,

Eva

Picture found on Pinterest.