Hope dangles on a string, Like slow spinning redemption.

I spent the weekend at Sugarloaf, which is hands down my favorite place to be. It's so incredible up there. It's basically a separate world, one without the day to day problems, and the built up emotions. One where you can just let go and be who you are, be who you want to be. You get in the car, drive for three hours, and arrive in this place where everyone is trying to be the best person that they can be, and no one remembers what dumb fight they were having at home.

There are some days, when it's snowing, that it feels like you're in the most beautiful snow globe on the planet. As you stand on the mountain and look down into Carrabassett Valley, you see nothing beyond this incredible wall of snow on all sides of you. You see the mountain, the trails, the people, and that's it. The coolest feeling is knowing that everything you're seeing is pure. The snow is beautiful as endless amounts of it fall from the sky. The people are incredible as they leave their troubles behind and strive to be a better person, if only for a while.

That's what I love about these places. Everyone has a place that means so much more than any other place to them. It's that feeling of relief that you get when you arrive. It's the peace that comes over you. There's nothing to it. No strings attached no commitment. There's just that feeling of knowing that whatever time, whatever day, whatever weather, whatever people are around, that place is always there for you. And each and every visit is as special as the last.

As you do whatever it is that you do at your special place, you can feel whatever emotions it is that you need to feel, and there is no one there to judge you. As I fly down the mountain on my skis, I can laugh about something that happened, I can talk to myself about how to fix a problem, I can figure out why something never happened, I can cry about the loss of a loved one. It's these things that really matter. It's this ability to be who you are and say what you feel that makes something like this so special. Without this unjudged, unbiased environment, no place would hold such a sacred place in anyone's heart. It is because of the unbiased lens of nature and all of her creations that we are able to feel so good about whatever we happen to be going through. The neverending judgement of our day to day lives orients us to feeling like we are no at good as we could be, as we should be. This place, this heaven, does not include any of that.

I am so grateful to have found such a place. Some people never find a place like this, a place that they can call home. Home doesn't have to be where you live, it doesn't have to be where your family is, nor does it need to be where you were raised. Home is deeper than that. Home is where you feel safe, where you are comfortable being you, where you never feel a need to be anything other than what you truly are.

It's an incredible feeling, to have some place to actually call home and to mean it. You're there, and you feel and see things you haven't felt in a while. You feel the emotions run out, the laughs resurface, the tears come and then go. You see the stars, as pure and as gorgeous as they get, and you know that those shining spots in the midnight blackness are your lost loved ones looking down on you and smiling because they know that you are happy. You see nature and people as they are meant to be and not as society forces them to be. Most importantly though, you see yourself as all that you want to be, all that you can be ... and you can finally accept it.

These places, these personalized safe havens, are gifts from God. They do not come as angels, nor do they surprise you with the strength of a miracle. Instead they wait, patiently, until you need them. And when that day comes, they are there, as pure and as incredible as they once were.

"Sometimes the best way to figure out who you are is to get to that place where you don't have to be anything else."
~Anonymous

In a life that harbors so many regrets as that of a human, one can live purely if and only if they allow themselves to first be vulnerable, and then be a shoulder to someone else. So then, could it be said that the only way to truly find yourself is to first let yourself be lost?