SURRENDER BUT HOW ??

experience is the best teacher (annoying)

I’m kicking off a brand new group coaching program called SURRENDER BUT HOW ?? SURRENDER IS PLEASURE

SURRENDER IS PLEASURE is a four-month group practicum where my spicy control freaks and sweet anxious babes will rework their mental, physical, spiritual, emotional habits so that they can build a life they actually ENJOY.

The following story is a Lesson Learned in Blood; I recount a time I did not Surrender nor Trust and the pain that subsequently befell me. Enjoy.

Cast your imagination back to January 2024.

The world is still deeply recovering from thee pandemy. Folks are unsure. Freaked out. Isolated. I am deeply burnt out from my corporate job, so I sign up for a weeklong Reset Retreat in Zihuatanejo, Mexico (ZIH).

My flight is scheduled to depart LGA at 6am.

4am and I’m in the Uber to the airport when I get a notification that my flight out of LGA is delayed, so I will miss my connection in DFW. The airline has rescheduled me on a different flight that doesn’t get me to Mexico until late the next day. I decide to continue to the airport and talk to the gate agent to see if there are any alternative routes.

I speak to a lovely woman at the check-in desk. She is extremely understanding and compassionate, but ZIH is a very small airport and there are only a handful of flights in and out every day. She tells me I can fly to Dallas and stay overnight, and then get on the one flight to ZIH the following day. There’s no other alternative. My Mom lives in Dallas, so I say that will be fine. The nice woman upgrades my ticket to first class since she feels bad I’m going to miss a whole day of my vacation and then checks my bag to Dallas.

I am resigned and frustrated, but trying to make the best of it. I go through security and I’m waiting for my (delayed) flight to leave LGA when I start looking up ways for me to get to ZIH today instead of tomorrow. I see there is a flight from Dallas to Mexico City, and then from Mexico City to Zihuatanejo this evening. I decide to ask the gate agent on this side of security whether it would be possible to reroute me.

As I walk over to the new agent, I hear a voice in my head tell me to Stop. Confused af, I come to a full stop in the middle of the airport. The voice is clear: Don’t Do This.

I think to myself, “Do what?”

I don’t really get an answer; more like an echo of the original message: Don’t Do This.

Still stopped in the middle of the airport, I do some mental gymnastics. I think to myself, “I’m just going to talk to the gate agent. What’s the harm in that?” (spoiler: much harm)

I ignore The Voice and move forward with my conversation. The second (!!) nice lady helps me reroute my journey once more:

• LGA → DFW this morning.

• DFW → CDMX this afternoon.

• CDMX → ZIH this evening.

She asks me to describe my checked bag, so that she can have someone find it and retag my luggage to Mexico City. She lets me keep my first class ticket and upgrades the DFW → CDMX leg, too. She can’t upgrade the CDMX → ZIH leg because it’s on a partner airline. No problem! I walk away thinking, God loves me! I’m gonna make it to ZIH tonight! It’s all good! Sweet, naive bby. You gon learn today.

I fly to Dallas no problem. I fly to Mexico no problem. I land in CDMX and go through customs. I head to baggage claim so I can get my bag and then recheck it for the last leg. I wait. I wait. I wait. The luggage conveyor shuts off. There is no bag. Fuck.

I find the airline agent at baggage claim. She does much tip tap typing and finally confirms that my bag was left in Dallas. Since ZIH is my final destination, I have to fill out a claim when I land there. It should arrive the next day at the latest. This whole rigamarole takes a long time. Like over an hour. I realize suddenly that I have very little time to get to my gate. I realize I am in the wrong terminal. I try to catch the airport train, but it’s too slow and I end up having to take a taxi !! to the correct terminal and then panic through security before SPRINTING to the gate. I finally arrive and they tell me the flight is delayed. Jesus. Did it say anywhere on the boards that my flight was delayed? Ofc not.

Exhausted mentally, physically, emotionally, I whatsapp one of the trip coordinators to update them about my bag. Knowing I have no clothes no toiletries no nothing for the next day, I wander around the terminal in Mexico City airport looking for shoes, bathing suit, anything. There’s a Lacoste store with polos and overpriced slides. There’s a souvenir store with exorbitantly priced handicrafts, including Mexican ponchos which I consider buying. As I’m browsing, I get a message back from the trip coordinator: the hotel driver can take me to a Soriana (like Walmart) before heading to our remote accommodation. That works for me, so I buy nothing at the airport.

Many hours later, my flight takes off and I eventually land in ZIH around 10pm. This is a small ass airport, and no one is working the baggage claim or any of the airline desks. I finally find someone from AeroMexico to talk to about my missing bag and they tell me l have to fill out a form online. Okay sure, fine.

I finally locate the hotel driver and he’s lovely. I ask him about the trip to Soriana and he tells me it’s too late; the store closed at 10 and nothing else is open. I will just have to try again tomorrow or wait for my bag. We drive an hour and a half to the hotel and I’m warmly greeted by one of the trip organizers. She kindly gives me an extra pair of pajamas and shows me to my room.

I finally — FINALLY — arrive to my shared accommodation and meet my roomies for the first time. I shower, tell them about my wild day, and snuggle down to sleep. It’s Mexico, in the tropics. It’s 70 degrees at night. I go to turn on the fan and one of my roommates says she can’t sleep with the fan on because she has wet hair and it will make her sick. I ask her if there’s some way we can compromise. She says she can try to sleep with the fan on the lowest setting. We do that. She falls asleep. I’m still too hot. I toss and turn all night.

I wake up the next day feeling rough. I want my bag. I want to sleep. I want to REST and RESET like I intended when I signed up for this trip.

The wifi in our rooms is weak. It’s too far and treacherous to walk from our outpost to the main hotel because the whole grounds are under construction. Someone drives me over in an ATV so I can try the wifi in the lobby. The AeroMexico baggage claim form doesn’t work. It just doesn’t. I try on my phone. I try on my laptop. I try on the receptionist’s phone. I try on the hotel computer. I can fill in my details, but I cannot submit the form. It won’t let me press enter. Then there’s a whole palaver about calling. Eventually I get through and AeroMexico says they will investigate, but I need to call back the next day. After 3 days of getting carted back and forth to the hotel lobby to use the phone, they eventually tell me that since American Airlines left my bag in Dallas, American needs to send it to Mexico City. American Airlines says that since AeroMexico flew me to my final destination, so it’s their responsibility to get me my bag. Cool cool cool COOOOL.

I have no bathing suit. No sandals. No fresh underwear. No shampoo. No face wash. I am brushing my teeth with my finger and washing all my clothes in the sink with the hotel soap every night. I am wearing my socks on the beach like a real dummy. There are no stores near our remote jungle hotel. I could go into town but it’s an hour and a half each way and for whatever reason I decide I don’t want to make the trip. Everyone is kindly lending me things, but I just met these people and I hate imposing. Cue waves of misery and crying in my room.

Rewriting all of this feels very first world problems.

What’s wrong with wearing basketball shorts and a tshirt socks on the beach? What’s so bad about having to rely on community for my basic necessities? In a normal situation, probably nothing. I probably could have rallied and had a way better attitude about the whole situation.

As it turns out, I had covid! I contracted it while traveling and didn’t realize how sick I was until Day 3 of the trip when I had constant headaches, fever, and sore throat. They didn’t have any covid tests at the hotel and the doctor in our group told me he thought I was just stressed about my luggage (lmao). But I took a test when I got home and sure enough, new covid variant. Covid always makes me feel emotionally depressed (I would love someone to tell me why that is), incredibly despondent and weepy. I ended up missing out on many of the retreat excursions and so much bonding because I was just too ill. It was ROUGH.

Unfortunately for me, this story gets worse before it gets better lol.

When I originally booked my trip, I planned to stay at the retreat for the week and then go somewhere else in Mexico for another two or three weeks. I hadn’t booked a return trip because I planned to work remotely and just ~~follow my inspiration. But by Day 6, I knew I needed to abandon my spontaneous travel plans and just get home. This is where things get worse. Remember the small ZIH airport? Remember how there are only a handful of flights in and out each day? On Day 7 of the retreat when everyone is flying out, there are no — literally zero — tickets for purchase.

I decide to try my luck with standby. I take the car to the airport with the rest of the people leaving the retreat. I make my way to the gate agents and ask to be put on standby. They tell me they can’t add me to standby at the check-in; I need to submit my information online. I ask them to direct me to the booking page and they say they don’t know. I start crying. I tell them I have to get home. That I have no bag, that I have nowhere to stay, that everyone I know from the retreat is leaving today. They apologize, but there’s nothing they can do.

I move to the side of the check-in and continue to cry it out. I am alone at this point and don’t know what to do. I FaceTime my Mom. She calls American for me since my phone doesn’t work in Mexico. They tell her that there is no online application for standby; the gate agents in ZIH are the only ones who can add someone to the list. I wait in line again and give the gate agents this information. They call a manager over. The manager listens to my story. He tells me the flight I am trying to get on is full, but there is a family running late who haven’t checked in yet. He prints me a boarding pass and tells me to wait until the check-in closes. I’ve done it. I’m going home!

45 minutes pass. The flight is delayed. The check-in counter stays open past it’s original closing time. Right as they are getting ready close check-in and escort me through security, the tardy family hustles in. My heart drops. I am not getting on this flight. The manager gently takes back my boarding pass and apologizes. I can try again tomorrow.

Numb and exhausted, I walk to a quiet corner of the airport and have a full on breakdown. I realize how much I’ve been keeping it together during the retreat, doing my best to fake a positive outlook around my roommates etc.

Tyler, one of the guys from the retreat, happens to walk by and my whole story spills out. He tells me he managed to get standby on another flight today, so I can try and have his reserved ticket out for tomorrow. I thank him. I call my Mom again (luv u, Mom) and she generously books me a hotel near the airport with a restaurant so I can get some soup and go to bed. I taxi over and I am literally the only person in this hotel. The restaurant is closed. There is nothing within walking distance. I cry some more. The lovely hotel manager helps me order some consommé and flautas to be delivered from a nearby restaurant. I thank her perfusely, eat my soup, and pass out.

The next morning I wake up to a text from my Mom that they managed to transfer Tyler’s ticket to me. I have a confirmed flight out of ZIH today. Holy Jesus thank u Lord. I am so grateful, I cry some more. I end up taking a final (naked) dip in the ocean to say thank you. Then I get back into those same damn clothes and head to the airport, boarding pass secured.

I manage to make it back to NYC without much more drama, but I was sick for another two weeks. My covid developed into viral strep. I couldn’t talk or swallow. I lost 12 lbs (major on this 5ft2 frame..) and stayed in bed for 10+ days. No bueno. My bag did make it home though, just 24 hours after I landed in NYC.

Hindsight is 20/20, but I hold this story close to my heart as one of my Lessons Learned in Blood. There are infinite moments where I could have released control, where I could have Surrendered to the flow around me and had a much nicer time. But I didn’t want to. I wanted things to go the way I wanted them to, no questions asked, no room for flexibility. And I brought myself a lot of heartache and pain because of it. This is not me berating or judging myself, here. I am just observing the consequences of my own actions with major gratitude (and some lols) for the lessons.

Whenever I feel myself trying to FORCE things or bend situations to MY WILL when it’s clearly a blocked path… I remind myself that REJECTION IS PROTECTION and that if I truly cannot make progress in something after giving it my best shot, then perhaps the best thing I can do is let it go and wait for the Universe to reveal a better way forward.

This is what it is to Surrender and Trust.

To 1. DECIDE that we are okay, even when — especially when — things are going perpendicular to our desires.

To 2. PRACTICE BEING OKAY and 3. RETURN TO PRESENCE as often we need.

To give ourselves grace and remember that 4. PERFECTION IS NOT REQUIRED in this human experience. We usually get more than one try to get things right, so if we mess up the first time... it’s okay.

We 5. MAKE ROOM FOR SILENCE so that we can integrate and assess our desires as we anchor into Surrender and Trust.

We 6. DOCUMENT OUR WINS so that we can train our brains to begin tracking evidence that Surrender // co-creation with the Universe actually is *the most logical* way to move through life.

Finally, we 7. GO IN FLOW aka JOYRIDE with the understanding that Surrender and Trust is a lifestyle that we return to over and over and over again. That new levels of challenge (and new levels of blessings and miracles !!) will arise. That’s what it is to be in this video game called life. Complete one level and then it’s up up up and onto the next. But that’s also the magic of this human experience: it gets BETTER, the more that we can operate with a foundation of Trust and Surrender.

I want you — and me — to live our best freaking possible lives. What else are we here for?? And so I commit myself to model teach embody this SURRENDER lifestyle, bringing as many angels along with me.

If you wanna learn more about my brand spankin new program, check out the WIP landing page at here. Lemme know what you think.

ilysm. thanks for reading. MUAH ♡