​“I find that by putting things in writing I can understand them and see them a little more objectively ... For words are merely tools and if you use the right ones you can actually put even your life in order, if you don't lie to yourself and use the wrong words.” Hunter S. Thomson
--from a letter to Larry Callen, July, 14, 1958 (found in the collection of his early letter, “The Proud Highway: Saga of a Desperate Southern Gentleman)”
 
I took the advice of Thomson and as I ordered my words, the word “wanderlust” came first. It came in the early teens driven by hours and days and nights of vicarious experience; the freedom of adventure on adventure as we plunged into an endless stream of novels set off-island in every-which-where places. It’s a beautiful and wonderful word.  
 
“Dépaysement” came years later. It carries that meaning of being somewhat lost, somewhat disoriented in a strange country and culture. It’s in the beauty of the word rather than any stirring of feeling. Let’s forget it’s a French word. There is a power of beauty in words!
 
What is the most ‘beautiful’ word in the English language? Is it “wanderlust” or “caramel” or “dépaysement"? “Caramel” it is; nothing on the World Wide Web comes close. It has a power of sound you can almost caress; a rich swirl of colour; a movement of associations.
 
It could be that the most beautiful word in the English language is actually a cluster of words. We think of ‘epiphany’ which is a gossamer uplook on a crystal, December morning; an eternal instant. Juxtapose this with ‘syzygy’ which is “the nearly straight-line configuration of three celestial bodies (as the sun, moon, and earth during a solar or lunar eclipse) in a gravitational system” Merriam-Webster) or expressed otherwise: Astronomy A conjunction or opposition, especially of the moon with the sun: ‘the planets were aligned in syzygy’ (Oxford dictionary). ‘Epiphany’, ‘wanderlust’, ‘syzygy’, ‘caramel’ do make a most unlikely quartet.
 
It’s time to temporarily ignore definitions and just find your own ‘most beautiful words’. Perhaps in 2016 you will also begin another journey of discovery, self-discovery, other discoveries starting with your own “most beautiful word(s).
 
Happy New Year!  

The balanced life: a practical aspiration or a myth? The chart above shows the “perfect” life. The ideal would be to spend equal amounts of time on all the components of our lives but the reality is that circumstances often change making it necessary for us to change with them for our own well-being. The end result of this is that one or more aspects of our lives suffer and balance is lost. Likewise, the focus of our lives changes from week to week, month to month, as we experience the expected and unexpected that comes with being alive. So should we be striving for balance, or a better understanding of how the components of our lives work together to either sustain or drain us?

The first step is for the individual to recognize the foundation they’ve built their life and all the other components upon. Is it upon the spiritual? The intellectual? Family and friends? What is it? Once we’ve identified this then we can build the other components on it and recognize that the foundation will always take up a substantial part of our lives because it is the thing that gets us through the difficult experiences.
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The second step is recognizing and managing the shifts that take place in our lives and figuring out how we can adjust the different parts of our lives to compensate for any changes. This way we don’t become disconnected or overwhelmed.  There are times throughout the year our jobs are more demanding and exhausting or we have family obligations, and the list continues. There will always be something but our foundation should keep us grounded and balanced. Perhaps the goal should not be to find a “perfect” balance but to be able to make the necessary adjustments and compensations that can help us to enjoy our lives and cope with the difficulties.

Here at CPAT our thoughts have been running on the term paths. There are so many quotes speaking about paths, both physically and metaphorically, encapsulating the idea of going somewhere and joys of following one's heart and dreams into the unknown. So we sat down and came up with some ideas. Here are some of our thoughts on paths.

One of the beauties of a path is that it runs two ways and only the individual on that path can say definitively whether they are going or coming.

Getting closer to our dreams can pull us further away from ourselves.

Paths can either lead to dreams or nightmares, towards satisfaction and fulfilment or thirst and disappointment but the most wonderful thing about a path is that is goes two ways and if you happen to find yourself on the wrong path turn around and go back.

Sometimes you have to go backwards to go forwards.

What if it were possible to walk two paths at the same time? To arrive at two different destinations at the same time? Would you still choose a single path?

The end result isn't solely determined by the path.

Don’t fool yourself, you are not the only one on that path.