Intuitive Breadcrumbs and a Bouquet of Dicks

In March of this year, I arrived in DC excited to check out the dating scene. I revamped my Tinder profile, uploading this illustration/painting of a bouquet of dicks surrounded by flowers onto my pics. I thought it was funny and also adorable. I guess I’m the kind of person who thinks a bouquet of dicks is adorable. Well, it got me kicked off Tinder almost immediately. So I had to use other apps and methods to meet people even though Tinder was my fave. 

Fast forward - in September, I left DC (the city really wasn’t for me) to explore my next move. I had decided to try out housesitting in various places for awhile until I knew where I wanted to settle down for at least a couple of years. I’ve been moving around a lot in the last handful of years and I’ve been feeling the call to root down and stabilize. 

(Keep following me here, it all connects, I promise.) 

My very first housesitting gig was two weeks in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin, which is just north of the Illinois border. I was driving through the area on my way back to Minnesota so it worked out perfectly. My first week there, I was searching through old e-mails, looking for something, and found some from an abusive ex, which was very triggering for me. It made me feel really lonely, so I decided I wanted to meet someone new while I was in town, since obviously I didn’t know anyone there already. 

I used a random app, one I never really used and didn’t even like, since I was still kicked off Tinder. And it was a very small town - very small dating pool. But I matched with this man who was an hour away. We met soon after. Turns out, we were immediately compatible and we fell for eachother hard. Even once I left my housesitting gig, we talked every day. He flew out here to see me. I won’t get into details too much here but suffice it to say it’s a relationship that’s equally healthy AND thrilling. And it showed up completely out of nowhere when I wasn’t looking for it. And now, I’m planning to move to the Chicago area to be with him and to get my own place to ground into, and to stabilize for a few years while I focus on creative projects. This move has been years in the making and honestly, I really just needed an anchor of love and support to help me get there.

If I wasn’t kicked off Tinder for a bouquet of dicks, if I didn’t move away from DC when I did because of my dislike of the city, if I didn’t decide to try out housesitting for what ended up being that one single gig in Wisconsin (somewhere I never would have stopped otherwise), if I hadn’t have been triggered by some old e-mails, if he didn’t set his dating parameters on the app as far as he did, none of this would have happened and I wouldn’t be on the current adventure I’m on. 

It’s easy for us to recognize the intuitive breadcrumbs to follow when those synchronicities are happy and magical. When we draw an oracle card and it fits perfectly with something someone said or something you saw. When you get a welcome surprise or you find money on the street. All of that is easy to follow. Easy to credit destiny. But when bad things happen, we tend to lose intuitive perspective and feel like because it’s bad, it means we’re on the wrong path. 

Alignment isn’t about always finding the happy breadcrumbs to lead the way. Alignment requires moves on both sides of Light and Dark, and those happenings that we consider bad are also breadcrumbs that are showing us the way. There’s just as much magic in our triggers and our disappointments, even if it’s harder to see through the intense emotions of them. 

And sometimes alignment means that our intuition gives us a plan to follow, only because putting that plan into action brings the real plan into view. And it’s easy to call yourself wrong or say that you made a mistake in your decisions, but it’s all breadcrumbs. Every step, every decision, every change.

Most people think that gratitude is the practice of positive thinking, but I don’t think that’s true. Gratitude is the practice of grace. Not necessarily forcing yourself to see the positive in each situation, but to appreciate the wisdom and information that situation gave you. To accept that the human experience is a full spectrum where you get to feel everything and constantly make different choices at every turn, following those intuitive breadcrumbs. It doesn’t mean you have to love every bad thing that happens to you, but it means that you can open your arms to grace and accept that those things directed you on your path.

Even if that path started with a bouquet of dicks.