Limits vs. Limitations

We are all just bumbling around trying to get love from and be loved by those around us.  It's all positively tragic because if we just loved ourselves the rest might just fall into place.  

Today was road trip day to the Blue Lagoon.  Like many trips it was far from direct.  1st stop was a sad little "zoo" where a couple of 10 year old Dominican boys helped us hold a rattlesnake; a baby hawk with 1 great majestic wing and 1 shrunken clipped wing; and poked at a crocodile in a cement cell until it snapped and showed us its teeth.  The day was not looking promising.  Then it was off to a wonderful farm were we sucked on cacao seeds, guanabana & coconut straight from the tree and that was all before the fresh fruits with honey that was served as our breakfast.  My favorite was the banana sprinkled with a mixture of 80% fresh cocoa & 20 percent sugar.  Genius!  Moving forward, I am sprinkling this on all my fruit.  Then it was off to sample the coastal beauty of Playa Calleton & Playa Grande; then a waterfall where a line of lithe Dominican boys jumped off the sloping edge for tip money and then FINALLY to the Blue Lagoon.

Lest I forget I was on a mission of growth and not purely sight-seeing; the universe provided me with another chance to fight the fat girl fear I have been harboring for decades.  A zip line. Over the water. *gulp* .  I couldn't do it.  Again 1 by 1; the girls whooped as they hung for dear life from the makeshift zip-line (basically some handlebars rigged through a nylon cord) until they reached high above the center of the lagoon and let go into the cool fresh waters below.  The fear was real.  This time there was no safety net.  My mind was chock full of images of me unable to hold on and tumbling down; my body limply bouncing off the rocky edge until it met the water with a low thud...ya...I'm not doing that.

No worries.  There was another option.  A jump, off of a clearing, straight down.  No fuss, No rocky edge.  Just run into the air. I was scared.  I didn't want to do it.  I had to do it.  A big middle finger to the fear inside me.  My friend counting down behind me.  5...4... God it looked like a long way down...3...2... 

It wasn't like I had never done this before.  Some years back I had somehow managed to jump off a 25ft cliff at Rick's Cafe in Negril, Jamaica.  Again, with the help of the crowd counting down behind me.  Once was enough.  I had vowed, never again.  

Here I was...again.  The fear felt silly; surmountable.  I had to push past the limits of my fear.

...1...

I closed my eyes and felt the air rush around me.  a moment of stillness.  my heart in my throat. then...

SMACK!

My "culo" hitting the water.  I knew right away;  I was not coming out of this jump unscathed.  Still even as I felt my back seize up while navigating my way back to dry land; I felt victorious.  And then I remembered.  Years back in Negril, after my jump,  I had bruised my coccyx and couldn't sit properly for the next 6 weeks.  I had pushed past my limits and was ecstatic.  But I had also failed to recognize my limitations.  I'm just not a girl who can jump from great heights; at least not physically.  And that is OK.  The question is, how do you determine a limit that you must push past from a limitation or restriction whether physical or other?  Don't know if I have that one figured out yet.  Some lessons need more than one chance before sticking.  But today as I care for my bruised bottom and soaring ego, I can say with conviction this time...Never again.  

It's so hard to load photos from here but here I am with the baby hawk.  

Hoping to load more pics soon!