Showing all posts tagged travel

In Culture, Identity, Politics, Relationships

Elbows Up

Author Julianne HarveyPosted on

The world feels like a total shit show right now. Since January 2025, when leadership (I’m using that word generously here) changed hands in the US, neighbourly relations between our two countries have sharply deteriorated.

We are known the world over for being polite. But being nice has its limits, and most Canadians have reached those limits by now.

My initial reaction to the tariffs and the threats of annexation was dismay. Then deep sadness and frustration. Now I’ve moved through those stages and into pure rage. I’m angry in my very bones. I feel offended and enraged that we have been targeted and provoked. And I know I’m not alone in this reaction.

This is our country, and we take our sovereignty seriously. When we travel internationally, we wear Canadian flags because we never want to be mistaken for Americans. We love being Canadian, and I take the actions of the current US administration to be acts of war. To me, this is serious business.

I have a lot of friends who live in the US, and I’ve reached out to several of them to tell them how I’m feeling. It helped me to talk it through with them. To hear their dismay and sadness and then anger. To know that on a personal level, we are not enemies, even while their political landscape attempts to turn us into adversaries.

As Mike Meyers said so well on SNL, for Canadians it’s time for “Elbows Up.” We live and breathe hockey since the time we are born, and elbows up means to protect yourself and be ready to fight back when your opponent throws down their gloves and readies for a brawl.

As a nation, we are ready. We will fight. We are angry now. Canadians have a long history of courage on the battlefield. We show up, we don’t back down, and we will fight to keep what’s ours and to not be pushed around.

There’s no sense wishing this wasn’t happening. It’s already underway. Pretending it’s a joke isn’t helpful. Along with many other Canadians, we are buying local and refusing to support the US in any way through travel or commerce. We are committed to growing our economy and sending the message that we will not be bullied, bought, or threatened.

The sense of betrayal we feel from America right now cannot be understated. I find it impossible to understand a majority of the country voting for this chaos, stress, horror, and hatred toward individuals and nations. The long term damage of what is happening here will have ripple effects for generations. When trust is broken, it takes a long time to repair, and it will never be the same.

As a country, our elbows are firmly up. Picking a fight with polite people doesn’t get you kindness in return. In this case, it gets you a show of strength.

Canada didn’t initiate this fight, but it sure as hell plans to finish it.

In Identity, Nurture, Parenting, Personal Growth, Travel

Another Bridge to Take

Author Julianne HarveyPosted on

In the song “This Ain’t Goodbye” by Train, there’s a lyric that brings me to tears. Every time he sings, “Another bridge to take on the way to letting go” I think about how hard it is to release my grip when I want something to stay the same.

But as we all know, life means change. Stages and seasons and growth and pain and learning to let go, over and over and over again. I really kind of hate this. You’d think we’d get better at this as we age, but some things give me a lump at the base of my throat, and keep me awake at night, and cause me to cry when I least expect them to.

One of those things is my youngest child graduating from high school. William has his school dinner/dance this weekend, and his commencement ceremony in a few weeks. This is a big bridge to take. When Ava graduated three years ago, I thought to myself, “William is only in grade nine. There’s lots of time left with a kid at home.”

And now the day is almost here. It’s a time to celebrate all that he’s achieved, and how bright his future looks ahead of him, but as the mom and dad, it’s also a time to grieve the end of his childhood. I’m really feeling the truth of the saying, “When raising children, the days are long but the years are short.”

With all of these significant life transitions (or another bridge to take on the way to letting go), I do my best to prepare emotionally ahead of time. I really do. But there’s anticipation, and then there’s experience. The two are never the same thing, which is another thing I hate because I have no choice but to walk through it when the time comes. Advance preparation only gets me so far, and then the only way out is ever through.

Another one of these bridges I had to take this month was when Ava decided to fly to New York City on her own and stay in a shared-room hostel near Central Park. We suggested she go with a friend, but after our family Europe adventure last summer she wanted to try a solo trip. In theory, I thought this was a fabulous idea, and very brave when you are only twenty-one. In reality, I worried about her until she arrived home safely—feet sore from walking the city at all hours and full to the brim with excitement and stories and joy from managing everything on her own.

These are important foundational experiences for our children to undertake. They have to learn that the world is a big place and they can be smart and travel safely within it. But for the parents, this involves a lot of letting go. Of being there when our kids need us, but not taking over every arrangement so they have their own chance to lead and to shine. It’s exciting. And hard. It requires us to give up some semblance of control, and to lean into trusting our grown kids.

I’m taking a lot of bridges right now, with both of my kids, and I’m slowly (so slowly!) learning to let go of them. Like so many parents, I’m proud, and I’m sad, and I’m a bit lost, and I’m celebrating at exactly the same time. We never stop learning how to adjust to these changing seasons.

Happy graduation weekend to you, William! Congratulations, and we love you.

In Culture, Identity, Minimalism, Nurture, Personal Growth, Relationships, Speaking

Anchored

Author Julianne HarveyPosted on
Anchored

For 2017, the three words I wanted to focus on were: open, accepting and anchored. The first two months of this new year are drawing to a close, and I would say that I’ve had a lot of opportunities to focus on being anchored.

I’m working hard on staying in the present moment. I’ve traveled a lot in February, flying to Alberta three times to present at teachers’ conventions in Edmonton and Calgary. Ava’s acting career has also been heating up with lots of auditions and some bookings for film and commercials. This has kept me busy, but in a good way, not a frantic one.

When you have a lot of balls up in the air, it really helps to take each day as it comes instead of worrying about the next day. Each one has enough challenges and excitement in it. I used to live so much in my mind, stressing out over things that were way down the road. This business of anchoring in to each present moment is so much better for my overall sense of life satisfaction.

Meditation has been a huge help to me since the beginning of January. I downloaded Insight Timer to my phone, a free app with lots of guided meditations to choose from on a variety of topics. It’s free (which I love) and setting aside ten to fifteen minutes each morning to indulge in meditation has calmed my mind and my soul more than I ever dreamed possible.

It’s not an overstatement to say that I feel like a completely different person. One that can handle uncertainty and short timelines much better than before. I can now roll with the punches and I’ve accepted that it’s fine not to have the next twenty steps neatly mapped out. It’s enough to know what I’m doing at this moment and have a vague idea of the next step. Anything beyond that feels too stressful.

Anchoring myself is a wonderful gift. I credit meditation as the number one change I’ve made in the last two months, but also simply fine-tuning my awareness and working at calming myself when I’m anxious has made a big difference to the overall peace I’m experiencing. Sometimes we need a scary illness like I had this summer to properly crystallize what matters and be finally able to let go of what hangs us up and  never really served us.

My need to control has been a lifelong habit, strangling me without me being aware of how hampering it was. But now I’ve learned a better way of coping, one that involves kind words to myself and to others around me, plus a clear understanding that I am in charge of very little in this life. And that’s okay. It’s up to me to keep my mind sharp and clear, to push out of the way all of the little irritations and time-wasters that conspire to steal my joy.

I’m feeling grounded, anchored, held. I can easily admit I don’t have all the answers. In fact, I have very few of them. But it’s really fine. No one has all the answers. If they say they do, they are lying to cover up their overall anxiety level. Gentleness works better. So does staying in the moment. Having a sense of humour helps too.

Worrying about tomorrow truly does rob today of its happiness. I’m not going to do that anymore. I’m staying here, right now, and noticing what’s in me and around me. What a difference this change has made to the quality of my days and my willingness to try new and challenging things.

In Minimalism, Nurture, Personal Growth

Saying Goodbye

Author Julianne HarveyPosted on Leave a comment
Saying Goodbye

We returned to Alberta on Thanksgiving weekend to pack up our house and say goodbye to the satisfying life we had built there over the last decade.

Closing chapters is never easy. Mixed feelings always seem to accompany change. We are all excited about a new adventure in the south surrey area of BC, but packing up our house and getting it ready for the family that bought it meant a ton of tears.

I loved my house. We moved there when Ava was three and William just seven months old. They grew from babies and toddlers into the kids they are today in that hallowed space. Every room held memories, laughs, change, despair and growth.

saying-goodbyeWhen I reflect upon those years, I realize how different I am at the end of them compared to the beginning. I went through profound changes while in counselling six years ago. I got to practice being who I really am instead of contorting to fit everyone else’s perceived expectations on me. I walked away from people pleasing and a whole lot of destructive relationships. I stopped being so earnestly good and instead looked for a variety of ways to free myself from excess noise, possessions, busyness and stress.

Our lives are made up of beauty and loss. We can’t move on properly to the next stage if we refuse to leave the current one, but the actual transition is unsettling. I’ve come to expect this when I’m moving into something new, but it never seems to get easier. The throat gets tight, the tears itch at the back of my eyes, I realize I’m tense and snapping at everyone because I’m so sad and I don’t know quite what to do with those big feelings.

The only way out is through. Skirting or minimizing only prolongs the pain. If we don’t acknowledge it and feel it when it’s fresh, the sadness becomes trapped and messes with our future happiness.

Saying goodbye properly is a skill. It requires attention and care. We must mark the occasion in some significant way. I had a good cry with both of my kids as we remembered specific things from our ten years of living in our house. It was important and holy work, sitting on the carpet in an empty room and telling stories.

Accepting that it hurts helps us to let it go and move on to what’s next. Life is meant to be experienced in all of its forms. I am tired of living small and afraid. The world is a big place and I long to get out there into it. I want more adventures and fewer possessions. I yearn for freedom to be my true self, to explore, to discover, to love better and wider, to go bravely inward as I travel on my own unique path.

How do you say goodbye when a stage is finished in your life? Do you avoid it or embrace it?