Sometimes the most powerful (and loudest) thing we can do is go silent.
After eight years of consistently sharing stories, interviews, and insights I decided I need to escape. So I left for the jungles of Central America.
I’m a world traveler, having been to 27+ countries, and there’s still places on my bucket list - like Japan and the Azores, Cambodia, Vietnam, New Zealand…but Central America is a place that’s relatively quick and easy to get to, but also fills my spirit. There’s something that lingers in the air there, a knowing for me.
So I left. Alone. No social media noise. Just a small bag and a one-way path toward a tropical outpost tucked between lagoon water and dense jungle.
What I found there was not an escape.
It was a remembering.
When the Journey Begins Before You Arrive
Getting there felt like an initiation.
A stranger picked me up in a pickup truck that broke down repeatedly along the way. Each stop brought another villager climbing into the back. By the time we reached the remote community after dark, I wondered if I’d done the right thing…
Travel has a way of stripping away control. It reminds you quickly: you are not in charge here.
A lady, who I now call a good friend…soul sister perhaps… welcomed me into her cabin. Over the next several days she introduced me to healers, elders, and locals whose presence carried a grounded wisdom you don’t find in books.
She is years older than me and moved through her days with a vitality that left me struggling to keep up.
And yet, between the movement and conversations, I experienced long stretches of stillness — the kind modern life rarely allows.
One afternoon I sat on the patio, watercoloring and staring at the lagoon.
I did almost nothing.
And it was exactly what I needed.
The Gift of Solitude
I came to the jungle carrying unresolved chapters, emotional noise, and the weight of intense months behind me.
In December, I intentionally stepped away from social media. The constant performance — the expectation to produce, share, and show up — was no longer aligned with what my nervous system needed.
The moment I stopped, I felt a physical release.
Silence is not emptiness. It is space where truth becomes audible.
The jungle amplified that silence.
Without distraction, memories surfaced — lighter times, earlier versions of myself, and the deep awareness that life unfolds exactly as it must.
There was the young woman who left her small town at seventeen to build a life of her own.
There was the free-spirited beach girl living near the ocean.
There was the mother raising her son in the mountains, growing food and tending a small farm before “sustainability” became trendy.
Each version of me felt fully alive in its season.
Each one prepared me for the next.
Purpose, Pain, and the Human Experience
Small towns teach resilience. They also reveal what happens when purpose is absent. I have watched people slowly disappear into alcohol and despair when they lose direction.
Purpose is not optional for human beings. It is nourishment.
The work I do today — helping people heal, reconnect, and rebuild relationships — was shaped by both my professional life and my personal trials. Writing my latest book forced me to sit with my own wounds, to remove bandages that no longer served healing, and to stitch together deeper understanding.
To help others, we must walk through the terrain ourselves.
You cannot truly understand low back pain unless you have felt it.
You cannot guide someone through grief, betrayal, or trauma unless you have stood in the storm.
That doesn’t make suffering desirable.
But it makes it transformative.
Meeting Wisdom in Unexpected Places
One of the most profound moments of my trip was meeting an elderly healer living completely off-grid — no electricity, no internet, no phone.
She shared a healing recipe with me using plants I recognized instinctively. Sitting with her felt like meeting an ancient memory within myself.
What surprised me most was that she asked me questions.
Her spirit was youthful, curious, and alive. The exchange was humbling — a reminder that wisdom flows in both directions when hearts are open.
Another day, an expat from the United States visited the cabin. We spoke for hours about ancient civilizations, spirituality, and healing. When I handed him one of the final advance copies of my book, I had a sudden clarity:
The final advanced reader copy of 7 Primal Wounds was exactly where it needed to be.
Signs, Synchronicity, and Stillness
The jungle has a way of speaking in symbols.
I stopped a man from stepping on a caterpillar — “That’s a butterfly,” I told him.
Later, I found myself surrounded by butterflies, they were swirling around me.
Moments like these feel small, but they invite awareness. When we slow down, we begin to notice patterns, timing, and the subtle choreography of life.
I spent time among Mennonite communities, ancient healers, and modern travelers — a convergence of worlds that felt improbable yet perfectly timed.
And in that stillness, I began to see what I could not see before.
Seeing Beyond the Jungle
When life becomes overwhelming, it can feel like standing in dense rainforest: thick, tangled, impossible to see beyond.
Yet just beyond the jungle lies the open ocean.
Silence helped me remember that.
I’m beginning to feel the horizon again.
Not in full clarity yet — but enough to know it’s there.
Choosing Growth, Even When It Hurts
If you are walking through something painful right now, I want you to hold this truth:
You are not lost.
You are learning.
Growth is rarely gentle. It asks us to release identities, relationships, and patterns that no longer serve who we are becoming.
We are always in motion.
Always evolving.
Always being shaped for what comes next.
What Comes Next
I return now…back to work, to responsibilities, to the next chapter. I still have weeks of quiet before my book launches, and I intend to use that time to continue processing and integrating what this journey revealed.
When I come back online, things will look different. Not because I’ve changed direction — but because I’ve come back into alignment.
The podcast will continue. Writing will continue. Speaking will continue.
Because communication, storytelling, and healing are not just what I do.
They are part of why I’m here.
And if there is one thing this journey reminded me, it is this:
We are exactly where we need to be — even when we cannot yet see the ocean beyond the trees.
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