Thoughts from one of those nights.

It's been one of those days, following one of those nights. 

Full of self-questioning, over analyzing, over fearing. blah-blah-blah.

We've all been there. It hurts, it paralyzes, it overfills, it spills, it burns. It even might seem like your most pessimistic, darkest self wouldn't even want to be a part of you.
Sounds familiar?

We all go through these hard nights, aka "The dark night of the Soul". The morning after, you might feel like you've been drained from yourself, anxiety might even take over. Energy is all over the place yet not really working for you. Sadness creeps in, self-doubt is your worst enemy -yet again! And whatever demons you thought you had already left behind come crawling back to the top of your head. Hey old "friend", I really didn't miss you at all.

The beautiful thing about this kind of mornings is... they are the perfect time to ask for help. To see yourself in all your shades, your dark spots and heavy areas with total humility & no self judgement. Your soul is calling, shouting really, for help and you are wide awake. You are willing to take another big step into growth, you are back in a place you already know to actually be humble enough and see yourself clearly. 

After a wild night fighting the ego-filled thoughts, and a morning loaded with self-work and meditation... This is what came up from my heart or, what I like to think, was given and said from above...(Thank you beloved Universe). Hope my words, and my personal experience find a way to your heart and maybe even fill a tiny empty area. Hope you breathe a little easier after reading these words and you get to rest in the beautiful truth that we are all just figuring life out. We are all going back to love. Enjoy,

"It is not enough to love me. I want you to allow me to love you. 
I want you to experience real love, so that you will cease to fear the darkness.
But can you experience the love you deserve with the same bitter expectations that have kept a heart closed? Can you recognize that you cannot keep hiding behind fear?
You deserve more than that. 
Can you allow yourself to receive?
You are in need of more sustenance, more love, more connection and nourishment. 
Will you allow love in? Even if it scares you to the bone?

Now is the time to gently, carefully, look back to the walls you once placed between yourself and everything you can't control- walls of tentativeness, excessive caution, fear of abandonment and betrayal, doubt of your own lovableness, and doubts based on past pain without substance.
These walls are the stuff that is designed for demolition, not devotion and honoring. Can you see the importance of this recognition?
Can you begin to unpack the bricks you believed were essential for your protection?

You are too vast a sea for that small puddle of thought now. 
You've grown. 
You can't keep forcing yourself to fit in smallness, self-pitty, and irrational fear. 

Allow yourself to receive. 
Allow love. 
Allow me. 
Allow yourself."
 

love always, 
F. 
#loqueescriboaveces

El placer de viajar sola.

A veces la vida no te da otra opción, a veces si.  A veces las ganas de viajar son más que las ganas de esperar a que alguien te pueda acompañar. A veces es más grande el placer de moverse a tu propio ritmo.  Nadie a quien esperar, nada que cumplir. Solo tú.

A veces viajar es algo que tienes que hacer por ti mismo, para crecer, para evolucionar y cambiar la perspectiva; y créanme que no hay mejor crecimiento que el que te llega rápido y de frente. El que no te llega por casualidad, si no porque tú lo estas buscando. Me gusta pensar que viajar es siempre buscar crecer, llegar a algún destino que te convierta en una mejor versión de ti. 

Viajar sola me ha dado tanto. Desde ese sentimiento de independencia y poder sobre mi misma, hasta experiencias que son sólo para mí, eventualidades con las que sólo yo me voy a quedar, Momentos en la vida que son un regalo, y que tengo el placer de vivir por mi cuenta. Viajar no siempre tiene que ser al ritmo de un programa o un itinerario, si no al ritmo en el que se presentan las cosas, y que mejor sentimiento que viajar por el placer de hacerlo y nada más.

Siendo mujer, tengo que admitir que a veces no es fácil viajar sola. Hay lugares que me exigen más preparación, más tiempo, más seguridad. Pero el hecho de que no sea algo tan sencillo hace que el viaje se vuelva algo único, un logro. Crecimiento que yo busqué. Todo siempre es como tiene que ser. Dejándote llevar llegas a donde tienes que llegar, y darte cuenta de que en realidad nunca estas perdida es uno de los regalos mas grandes de atreverte a despegar.

Escribo esto sentada en un avión, en medio de mucha gente que no conozco. Y aunque estoy sola, en realidad me siento bien acompañada, porque viajando me he dado cuenta que no tengo mejor compañía que la mía.

Mis queridos viajeros, espero se animen a despegar solo(a) por lo menos una vez en su vida, sin ninguna razón de por medio, más que el placer de conocerte a ti mismo.

Les escribo muy pronto, amor siempre.

#loqueescriboaveces 

F. 

Sometimes.

Sometimes you just need to go off the grid and get your soul right.

Mexico City Series / La Lagunilla Market #VISITMEXICO

Hello dear reader, thinking about visiting Mexico City? Don't think twice.

Let me show you around our real Mexico. One of my all time favorite things to do at the city: Antique shopping at La Lagunilla Market. You'll fall in love, mark my words. 

Meet my dear old, beautiful Mexico. Located right in the center of this infinite city, La Lagunilla Market opens all Sundays without exception. Streets full of rich, forgotten history, blending beautifully with the chaos of this huge market, thousands of people buying and selling. Old houses full of antique furniture waiting to come back to life. 

You can find anything here: from old books and cheap antiques, to furniture, crystals, used clothing, old records, beer, tacos, hand made body oils and perfumes. Collectables and junk all mashed up together. Paradise for passion hunters. Pure magic I tell you. MÉXICO MAGICO. 

This market is located right next to Tepito - aka 'el barrio bravo'. So you shouldn't wear or carry anything valuable. Better if you get dropped and picked up by UBER, you can also get around with public transport, metro La Lagunilla is located just a block away from the market itself. 

Our traditional Quesadillas. 

DO'S

• Get there early (10am)
• Bargain - most prices are elevated, you can (and they expect you) to ask for a better price. 
• Eat local food - never say no to real Mexican food. 
• Ask for 'La calle de las antigüedades' - Most of the market is full of cheap things, true treasures hide in old houses in certain streets. 
• Bring cash - only. Leave your wallet at home. This city site is well known for pickpocketing. A fanny pack is really the best choice for your money and cellphone. 

DONT'S

• Wear anything valuable. Leave your wrist clock and jewelery at home.
• Make anybody mad. People here usually have eachother's back reaaally protected. Gangs may be around.
• Leave your kids unseen. Don't let them wander off. Losing your peeps here is really easy. 
• Show off. The less, the better. 

Have fun, buy history, eat local. Fall in love with our beautiful, chaotic Mexico.  

I remember, I dream.

Here I am, a bundle of past recollections and future dreams, knotted up in a reasonably attractive bundle of flesh. I remember what this flesh has gone through; I dream of what it may go through.

-Sylvia Plath

A reminder.

And yet, you kept going.

Proyecto Botánico

Les presento un proyecto que ví nacer, en el que creo profundamente y el cual consumo ahora en lugar de cualquier producto típico de higiene personal. 

Proyecto Botánico

La semana pasada me llegó un paquete lleno de productos de higiene personal, sin ningún tipo de residuo químico. Si, 100% natural. A tu puerta. Para tu cuerpo. Para TU TEMPLO. 

El Kit contiene:

• 1 desodorante (libre de aluminio) 
• 1 pasta dental carbón activado (libre de fluoruro)
• 1 enjuague bucal
• 1 cepillo dental ecológico (100% biodegradable) 

No me puedo cansar de decirles que prueben estos productos hechos a mano. Los beneficios de dejar de comprar marcas tóxicas y dañinas no solo al cuerpo si no también al medio ambiente son muchos. Demasiados. 

Adiós animal cruelty, adiós toxinas, adiós químicos que no conozco en mi boca y cuerpo. 

Hola vida. 

Puedes pedir tu Kit aquí, llega a la puerta de tu casa. 

About self love...

In order to love who you are, 

you cannot hate the experiences that shaped you. 

- Andrea Dykstra

Photo by Fernanda Casillas

Wearing Alo Yoga / Yoga Mat from Manduka

A place called Haramara

Welcome to beautiful Haramara Retreat, placed in the out skirts of Sayulita, Mexico. 

A place you'll never forget, perfect for personal and/or group retreats, the mexican yoga palace. 

Find more info here: haramararetreat.com

Did you know?

Here is the deepest secret nobody knows.
Here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
And the sky of the sky of a tree called life;
Which grows higher than soul can hope or mind can hide.
And this is the wonder that’s keeping the stars apart.
I carry your heart.
I carry it in my heart.

— e.e. cummings

Thoughts.

I was the Ocean to your tide, 

you kept pulling me in, 

and then pushing me aside.

#loqueescriboaveces 

Recorrido por el Caribe con Pullmantur: Cartagena, Colombia.

Segunda parada: Cartagena llena de vida!

Paraíso de color, vida pura. 

Recorrido por el Caribe con Pullmantur, ARUBA.

Empiezo hoy un largo recorrido por el Caribe con Grupo Pullmantur. 

Primera parada: Aruba. 

Pie de la Cuesta, Guerrero, México.

If you resist change, you resist life.

— Jaggi Vasudev

Surf sessions at Sayulita, México.

Scuba love. Playa del Carmen, México.

A little bit of my 2nd Scuba certification at beautiful Playa del Carmen, México. 

Isla Holbox, México

Next stop, one of my favorite places on planet Earth, Holbox Mexico! I can't even begin to explain how my heart aches to go back. This is definitely a place I'll be looking to come back anytime I can. I don't know if my inevitable love affair with this place was due to the fact that I really needed to disconnect from my life, or the unbelievable rush I felt when swimming with a gigantic creature next to me. 

Whatever it was, it marked me for life. Loud and clear. 

One of my all-time favorite places, ever.  

Holbox, meaning "black hole" in Yucatec Maya, is an island in the mexican state of Quintana Roo. An out of time place that is also part of the Yum-Balam Biosphere Reserve. The only way to access the island is through a ferry from the town of Chiquila. ($30.00 usd) Not yet heavily touristed, there are no cars.. only golf cars. But you can easily bike your way through the entire island. The perfect place to just lay down, and be.

One of the most beautiful things about this place, (I mean, next to the crystal-like water and amazing sunsets) is that you have to take a boat ride to get to it. (40 min ride at the most) No cars are allowed on the island, you have to walk or bike ride and for greater distances you can pay for a golf car rental. 

Life is THAT simple here. 

You may also see the great biodiversity and beautiful ecosistems this island holds. From racoons to whale sharks, flamingos to manatees. And locals who take care of such richness. Every corner has its bundle of life. 

On the fifth day of my trip, I was able to join a guided tour to swim alongside the gigantic whale shark. This has been, by far, one of the most significative life changing moments I have been lucky enough to experience. There are literally no words whatsoever to what I felt underwater, swimming next to this beautiful teachers. I swear I heard them talk to me. I might be crazy, but in that moment they really talked. And I listened. 

I was also lucky enough to give a little piece of my heart in return. I had the chance to work as a volunteer in an animal shelter called 'Alma Verde'. A non-profit organization that takes care of hurt animals around the island. I fed the kitties, the orphaned raccoons and helped a pelican get back to the ocean. I also helped around the house cleaning and petting the animals that needed it. 

Overall, this has been one of the most magical places I've ever been to. I had a heart-deep connection with myself and I got a glimpse of what I want my life to be like someday. I encourage you to look for this kind of trips, look for change,  stay close to yourself, to your needs and to your desires. Your heart needs it. You need it. 

Much love to all!

F.

Chiapas, México.

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A while back ago I got a map on my birthday. I started picking places from Mexico that I had already visited. Being born in México, it was shocking for me to realize that I had a few (a lot actually) places on my map without a checkmark. It was obvious to me that if I wanted to see all these places, not just from México but from around the world, I needed to start traveling alone, nobody to wait for, nobody to stop for. So this is a start. The beginning of a trip for myself.

Welcome to Chiapas! The first trip paid by me, for myself only. Chiapas is located in Southeastern Mexico, bordering with Guatemala. In general, Chiapas has a humid, tropical climate. It is also home to the ancient Maya ruins of Palenque, Yaxhilán, Bonampak and Chinkultic. A week in Chiapas was more than enough to fall deeply in love with the jungle, the city, the ruins. 

I started my week-long tour at Palenque. Among so many green, Palenque is an amazing place with so much history. Beautiful ruins so out of time, naturally absorbed by the jungle that surrounds it. The size of the ruins will make you wonder how the hell were they built so long ago, without technology, bull-dozers or whatever. I mean, really, only human (super human) force. Tenoch, our guide, proudly told us all about the history of the place. Palenque ruins date back from 226 BC to around 799 AD. The jungle is covered all over with all the amazing kinds of green you have ever seen; mahagony, cedar and sapodilla trees are popular at the region. Humidity at its finest. We had the chance to explore for about 4 hours, I do recommend you to ask for a personal guide, so much history and interesting facts lay underneath the ruins. 

Take note: you need good, closed shoes, you'll sweat like you never have, bring water.

Yoga here is a must. 

Next stop, la Selva Lacandona, (Lacandon Jungle). It covers an area of approximately 1.9 million hectares extending from Chiapas into northern Guatemala and southern Yucatán. Here you NEED a guide. This guide will not only be of great help, but also your passport into the jungle. Locals don't like tourists, your guide will be the friend in between. I can't even begin to explain the humidity, we were lucky it wasn't that sunny. I had the chance to stay here an entire day, i met locals and I was invited to their house. Sadly taking my camera with me was just not an option. They believe that cameras in general take a portion of their souls when taking a picture. They live 100% from the jungle, so they protect it with their heart. (As we should protect our environments). 

Cataratas de Agua Azul is a waterfall body that consists of many cataracts following one after another. Located just 69 km away from San Cristóbal, perfect blue water with high mineral content. Beautiful view all-around, and a large market by the side where you can buy almost anything. From coconuts to wetshoes. 

One of my favorite places had to be at the border between México and Guatemala. (I lived in Guatemala for almost 6 years and its safe to say its one of my favorite places on this planet) Río Usumacinta defines part of the border between Guatemala & Mexico.The view is UN-belivable, it really is. There's a really good restaurant at the top of a hill where you can see both countries sharing this beautiful view. 

(I had to hug Guatemala's geographic limit)

My last place to visit was magical. Cañón del sumidero, a deep narrow canyon surrounded by a protected national park, located just north of the city of Chiapa de Corzo. You can take a tour on a boat that will take you through it. You may get wet, but trust me it is absolutely worth it.