Fair Trade

Everyday we trade things. I began trading stickers in primary school. Two scratch and sniff stickers were fairly negotiated for a puffy Scooby Doo. I was an avid reader as a girl. Library books were traded and consumed over and over again. Global economies are upheld by a trading system of commodities and stocks, and our financial stability is waged on the culmination of good and bad, long term and short term decisions.

I traded 2 days of travel for an adventure between the Sea and Sky. I spent many hours in airports and airplanes, so to visit my incredible friends on the west coast, and one hell of an amazing city. As I flew across the country last week...over mountains and prairies, through cumulus clouds and time zones...I thought about the trade off.

If we place the highest worth on those things that are most precious and impossible to duplicate, then the expense of our time should have the highest trading value in our lives.

Sometimes we realise after a transaction, whether it was financial, emotional, spiritual or an increment of time, that perhaps, we made an unwise decision with our investment. As it may be, the pay off wasn't equal to the contribution. Or we realise what exists, was bound to change and develop...and the initial investment grows into a very valuable and strangely prismatic personal masterpiece.

We don't get our time back. Hopefully, we mindfully trade into those things and people that are going to provide a continual and flourishing return. A fear faced and conquered provides the most gratifying return on your trade. A fear faced and failed at, still provides valuable lessons and tools for the future. When we know better...we do better.

So think about what you're trading...your time..your heart..your money..your peace. Choose honesty. Work to follow your heart in your trades. Be fearless. Even if the only outcome you land with after the leap is clarity...I venture to declare, it was worth it.

“You have to let go of who you were to become who you will be.” ― Candace Bushnell