Manifesting Home

In my last blog post I wrote about wanting to stay in Bali longer. Well, I worked things out so I could be here until mid-September. I’m so grateful to have given myself the gift of 2 more months here in Bali.

I also wrote a little about the simple room with beautiful view that I’ve been living in for the past four months.

Small rooms and small houses are typically appealing to me. There is a cozy quality to them that has felt comfortable. Big houses and big rooms have felt a bit too cavernous.

So I’ve been pretty happy in my simple little room. It’s comfortable and familiar.

But the past couple of weeks a few of my friends here in Ubud began to find these gems to live in:

Tarra found an incredibly private and quiet house with a Balinese temple and rice fields in her backyard. Diane moved into a beautiful villa with a bathtub that could (quite comfortably) hold three of us-no problem. Zuri got an Eat, Pray, Love house with hardly any walls and luscious nature all around. Chess found a villa that he can barely talk about without grinning from ear-to-ear. And of course Robin has her elegant yet homey villa.

And then there was me.

In my simple room with a nice view. On a nice street that I love with my rice field walk at the end of the lane. It feels comfortable and familiar there but…

It comes with:

a bathroom that smells a bit because they never clean it very well.

a lumpy bed that hurts my back.

a pillow that isn’t comfortable yet I keep putting up with.

sighs from the owner when I need more toilet paper. (Excuse me?! I’m a woman. Hello.)

After hearing my friends gush about their new villas or (even more challenging) visiting them in their villas I’d come home to my simple little room and look around and think, “This isn’t doing it for me anymore. I want luxury. I want beauty. I want elegance. I want a bathtub. I don’t want a stinky bathroom or a lumpy bed anymore.”

Last Monday things came to a head:

1) I went out to dinner with my friends and it seemed all they could talk about (bless their little hearts) were their villas. (At one point I said to everyone, “I’m realize I’m jealous when I hear you talk about your villas.” It felt good to tell the truth about it and hearing myself say it made me aware that I’m the only one who is forcing me to stay in my somewhat-stinky, small room (with nice view).

2) I came home late that same night and asked my landlord for toilet paper and he sighed the biggest sigh ever. He then commented on how I’m staying in high season for low season price and that I had to leave and find a new place to live. I convinced him that I needed to stay as I didn’t have another place to go and it was high season. He reluctantly said I could stay until September. This was at 10:30 at night.

3) I was awake from midnight to 5am due to loud music a few doors down.

Since I couldn’t sleep due to the music and my hamster brain, I wrote in my journal about wanting to find a new home.

Here’s what I wrote at about 3:00 am:

I want to stay in a gorgeous place for the rest of my time in Bali. That would be a gift to myself. I’m trusting that the right house will call me and forces will line up to make that happen. I’m completely trusting that. Being here in this small room feels like contraction. I want to expand. I’m ready for expansion. I’ve experienced expansion inside of me thanks to my inner and outer experiences in India and Bali and I’m ready to experience that expansion in a home now.

The energy I want in my new home is: expansive, open, light-filled, peaceful, private, soothing, abundant.

I want my new home to have:

-garden bathtub

-WiFi so I can Skype with my friends in California

-maid 3x a week at a time that is convenient for me when I’m gone

-ultra quiet

-gorgeous nature view

-meditative space

-beautiful and elegant

-a price I can easily afford

-10 minute bike ride into town

-bed for lounging outside

-Bonus: a pool would be nice

And then I wrote: I can see, picture and feel it and so it is out there waiting for me.

Now the above may not seem like a hard thing to manifest in Bali but here’s the thing: it just became high season in Bali. Suddenly there are barely any crappy rooms left let alone really nice places at a good price. It’s a Joseph-and-Mary-looking-for-a-manger kind of a deal right now.

Not the best time to look for a beautiful villa at an affordable price.

But in spite of knowing that I began looking. And looking. And looking. I would feel discouraged when I would see so many houses that were so not what I was looking for. Some moments I would slip into a house coma where I was simply living/eating/breathing finding a new house. Other times I’d be buoyed by feeling into the house that, deep down, I knew was waiting for me to find it.

I had the sense that these ‘breakdowns’ with my small room was a boot from the Universe and Bali to move me into a more abundant, beautiful space.

I also became aware of my hidden resistance to finding a great place because then, I thought, it will be really tough to go back to California. Bali has been so mind and heart-opening amazing already. If I move into a gorgeous place with a comfy bed and a non-stinky bathroom how will I ever pull myself away to return to California?

I became consciously willing to enjoy a great place and to be aware that leaving that great place in September may bring up some uncomfortable feelings.

Oh well.

It’s worth it for 2 months of bliss in a gorgeous place.

And here’s the cool thing: once I started looking for the house I could feel it. Not all the time but some of the time. Even though it wasn’t yet in my physical reality.

It was a really cool experience.

I stopped calling what I was doing ‘house hunting’ because that implied violence. No, what I was doing was aligning with what I knew was already out there waiting for me.

I tell friends this all the time: if you want to manifest something, anything, then take action and let go. It’s simple but not always easy if you are very attached to getting what you want when you want it (which, personally, I usually am).

Manifestation is about finding that fine line between action and surrender.  If I can get into that sweet spot of surrender and I take inspired actions around it then I WILL MANIFEST WHATEVER IT IS I AM WANTING.

Getting to that sweet spot sounds simple. And maybe for some it is. For me, not so easy…

But I could feel myself doing it. Action/surrender. Action/surrender. Action/surrender. A dance between two polar (for me anyway) opposites.

So:

Tuesday: I look at many rentals, all of which are completely not what I want and too expensive.

Wednesday: I look at many rentals, all of which are completely not what I want and too expensive. At dinner a friend casually mentions a villa he’d looked at and loved but he’d decided to go with one that was a little lower priced.  I felt my body respond to this villa when he talked about it. I felt a rush of energy. A quiet YES inside.

Thursday morning: I look at the villa and fall completely, head-over-heels in love with it. Completely. At one point I realize that I’d been to a party at this villa last year and had been blown away at that time by the spaciousness and beauty of this place.

It had everything on my wishlist including a bed outside, a meditation/dance room with 40-foot tall ceiling and not one, but two incredible garden bathtubs (!) and a gorgeous infinity pool (my bonus item).

I offer the Balinese brothers who own the villa less than half of what they are asking.

It’s what I feel I want to pay given it is nearing the end of my trip (and even the amount I’ve offered is pushing it a bit) but what the hell. I’m in Bali. It’s an incredible villa and worth even more than they were originally asking per month.

They say they need to think about it. I drive away. I have the taxi driver turn around and I offer exactly half of what they are asking. They tell me they need think about it and will call me in the afternoon.

They don’t call me in the afternoon. I pace around a bit and then I call them.

“We are 75% sure that we will rent to you. We will let you know in the morning,” is what they said.

(I wasn’t surprised. This happens to me when I want something. My life lesson is patience. Shit. I hate that life lesson. Can I trade for yours? Right now?!)

Inside of myself I could mostly feel that the house was mine. There was a slight twinge of ‘what if I don’t get it?’ but mostly I could see myself living there, holding our Ubud writing circle there, having parties, spending delicious meditative and quiet time with myself, reading in one of the 4 beautiful beds, etc, etc, etc.

Friday morning: They don’t call. I pace around and then I call them.

“Just checking to see if I can rent the house?” I say, trying not to sound too eager.

“You come over,” the landlord says.

“Okay, I come over and bring deposit,” I say.

“No, you come over. We talk first. No deposit. First we talk,” he says.

Oh yes, this isn’t America. This is Bali where you talk a lot and things take time. Oops. I forgot. Thanks for the reminder.

“Okay,”I say.

I bring as much cash as I can stuff in my purse for a deposit.

I walk up to the gate and I can feel it. It’s where I’m going to be living for the next 2 months. I’m not feeling cocky, there is simply a surety within myself. And a connection to this beautiful house.

I see the landlord.

“Okay, you can rent the house,” he says.

This was our talk? But I haven’t said a word.

Instead I smile.

“Thank you,” I say.

I give him the deposit money and he writes out a receipt. “I hope you be very happy here,” my new landlord says kindly as he hands me the receipt.

Two little Balinese kids huddle around the table watching us exchange the cash and the receipt. They giggle.

I do too.

I’m still giggling.

And pinching myself. And hooping and hollering in this very big house that is beyond my wildest dreams.

Manifestation of wishlist villa from start to finish: 3.5 days.

Thanks Bali!

Forgot to mention that there are beautiful rice fields outside my windows and a bunch of ducks that live there.

And many frogs.

And fireflies.

Tagged as: Bali Home, Bali Villa, House in Bali, Manifesting Bali Home, Ubud Villa