My whole life I felt like I didn't belong. The feelings of being inadequate and out of place are in my memory since my early childhood. I was bullied in school and home was not exactly a safe haven. I remember crying almost every day in elementary school because of different reasons that included being bullied and also feeling less smart for not catching up with class lessons and materials.

Though I grew up in the same elementary school and for most of my middle school years, I attended three different high schools that went from one side of the world to the opposite side of it. I attended school in Mexico, Hong Kong, Texas and Pennsylvania... these were all very different kinds of schools and it was not easy to adjust.

I did my best to do things I liked such as playing volleyball and staying active in school. In Hong Kong I was chosen as team captain for the following year but we moved and that never happened. In Texas I was voted to be the VP of the school newspaper but then we moved and that never happened. By the time I got to Pennsylvania I was exhausted and jaded by having lost friends as soon as I had made them. It didn't help that I was not used to East Coast winter weather and that the school I was in was much less diverse than the other schools I had attended.

In short, I never belonged. Even when I excelled at doing certain things I always felt out of sorts and left out. I struggled with serious depression and social anxiety and it was hard for me to keep friends.

But some how, solitude and connecting with nature always made me feel tranquility. While living in Asia I was exposed to different cultures and religious beliefs and I fell in love with exploring temples and spiritual centers that I had never known existed. Furthermore, walks in nature and being close to bodies of water always soothed my soul.

There was always a prevalet, consistent, dependable Presence that I (to this day) cannot name or label. It is a Presence that makes me feel awe, amazement and reverence and the best way to describe it is with the word love.

I didn't know I would embark on writing The Present Presence until I began to piece together the letters that I had written to myself from different representations of unconditional love for me. For instance, I wrote letters to myself from my mother after she had passed away. I also was inspired by the Buddha, Guan Yin, Jesus and Mary to write different forms of loving expressions to myself. I wrote those letters when I felt like I needed to reconnect to the feeling of being seen and loved for who I am.

My hopes through this blog is to document and share my experience as I work on The Present Presence. I also hope to build some community around the etheral and yet very powerful idea of unconditional love and the mysterious Presence of the divine.

Thank you for your time and attention. Feel free to reach out any time!