We’ll use our hearts as knots, with strength in scars and stitches — now a rope to hold. Photo in Reykjavik, Iceland.

I’m Traveling the World Collecting Feelings

It’s an exploration and a celebration of our hearts, and I want you to take part.

Heart to heart, I’d like to congratulate you. It’s been a long road. You’ve done a lot of things. You’ve been a lot of places. You’ve been given away and returned, torn down and built up, emptied and filled, battered and healed - but you’re still here, beating on. You’ve wandered through mazes of emotions, and you’ve lived to tell the tale. Now, I want to hear it.

Tell me - what is the greatest feeling we can experience as humans, and why?

Okay, okay - maybe I’m jumping the gun a little. I’ll explain.

Once upon a time, in a land far, far away - I was trapped in the tangles of my blankets wrestling with a feeling that had haunted me several times in my life. My bones ached. My frame felt hollow. I missed something, so much, that my body was physically revolting it’s absence. All I could think about, though, was how amazing it was that I could ever be so full of a person, a place, a time - whatever it is, that I could feel it’s absence in my bones. Being me - I smiled and thought to myself, “this has to be one of the greatest feelings we can experience, I should try to capture it in a poem.”

Later, I spoke to someone about it and they quickly began to think about their own greatest feeling. They immediately gave up a piece of themselves to me, that part of their heart they’d felt the most. It wasn’t anything like mine, and that made it even more beautiful. What they’d shared, and their openness in sharing it, had filled me with their feeling so much I had to write about it too. Something started building in my head, but I needed to explore more.

What does it take to get someone to open up?

I posted this status to see what would happen, and I ended up dancing around like a giddy five year old all day. (That may or may not be common behavior for me.)

So many people started messaging me. My closest friends, people I had hardly spoken to - even strangers, all bearing their hearts for me to see. With answers filling a range as vast as the spectrum in a rainbow, I was amazed. Themes starting appearing as well, webs of words and relations shared with me by individuals in different countries, age groups, professions, etc. I wished that they could all see how connected they really were - maybe buy a tv spot and publicly announce “open your heart and collect your feels, share them with the world, and know that no matter what we’re all connected somehow.”

That’s not really my style, though.

I know words, and I’ve been (at least attempting) using them to convey feelings through poetry for as long as I can remember. Now, that’s exactly what I’m doing with the feelings I’ve been gifted - by turning them into a series of haikus entitled “Ways to Feel Human”

As I embark on a nomadic journey starting in Iceland and winding through most of Europe, I’m going to leave them for you too. You’ll find them on your benches and street signs, stealing the shadows in your corners and replacing them with a piece of someone’s heart.

Looks like my poem magically floated into and found a home in a subway station. This is the first piece in the series, find it here!

I want to hear from you, too.

Come on, you knew it was coming. I want to know what that feeling is for you. That thing that hits you and amazes you every time it comes around, positive or negative. Together we can take the parts of ourselves that are the same and those that are different and combine them into one really amazing unifying whole.

What do you think is the greatest feeling we can experience as humans and why?

This can be a literal emotion, or something more abstract, e.g.:
“The blissful feeling at the end of yoga class.”
“The feeling of finishing x thing (or starting x thing).”
Whatever it is for you, I’d love for you to share it here.

All answers will be kept anonymous.

All the invites to the party.

Here are things you can do if you want to join in.

1. Send me your feels.
2. Send this post to someone you like a lot ❤
3. Follow along with the feels on Medium.
4. Share the feels - you can do this part of the party the normal social media way, but I think stickers and handmade things are pretty awesome too. Contact me and let’s do something cool.

Thank you, hearts, for doing so much and making it to me today.
Let’s go forward together.

I’d love to talk to you more on Twitter.

❤ If you like this post or this project, it’d mean a lot to me if you hit the recommend button below.

To see the rest of the series, follow the collection here.

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