May 9, Wednesday.

And so my European trip begins again; therefore, my Eurotrip Blog begins anew. This time Italy, which I’ve been dying to get back to ever since last time I was there, on my original European Tour when I’d gotten sick and couldn’t totally appreciate this wonderful country. The time before that had happened many, many years ago just before the iron curtain fell when I and my son, Dave, accompanied my daughter, Jaime and my ex-wife Judy who sang with the olde American shape-note singing group, The Bayley-Hazen Singers, on their tour to Italy and Hungary. We all adored Italy.

This trip started off with me driving to Miami, dropping my car with Dave, having lunch together, and where he told me of his big plans to build on his new land in Costa Rica. That was great, but now I am off.

So much has happened in the Three Principles world since I first went on my European Tour in 2014. The Principles were so new to Europe then; very, very few Three Principles teachers had gotten around outside of the UK. Now there is so much activity and “competition” with various events, it’s even been tough to fill our Spain “Transcending the Personal” Retreat in June, co-facilitated by my wonderful friend, Gabriela Maldonado-Montano. So if you’re reading this out there, folks, we still have room and it promises to be a deep and exhilarating one, so we would love you to attend. See event posted on my training schedule page

May 10, Thursday.

I saw a great movie on the plane last night, which I missed in the theaters last year. Hacksaw Ridge. I would have picked it as best movie of the year. True story about a conscientious objector (like myself) who joined the army as a medic (unlike myself) and would not touch a rifle. The army unit he was assigned to did everything in their power to make life miserable for him and kick him out to the point of nearly court-marshalling him, and he turned out to be the greatest hero among them, singlehandedly saving many, many lives against great odds. Just goes to show you. There is so much narrow-minded thinking in the world, all creation from the power of Thought used against our fellow human beings, the opposite of wisdom. Eventually they saw and came to honor him and ate crow, but they could have reached that conclusion before causing him so much grief. But people can only see what they can see, until they see it.

I had gotten so cocky about my stomach feeling so good lately—it had given me a fair amount of problems in the past–that I decided to experiment and go off my gluten-free diet. So right now it is feeling just like it used to feel: bloaty, gassy; plus, I’m mucousy and have a slight headache but that could be from the lack of sleep on the plane. I didn’t think I had slept at all but I must have because when I opened my eyes I notice everyone had finished their food and I hadn’t gotten mine. Gluten tastes so wonderful! Darn, I guess I really can’t eat it without suffering. But I’m about to be in Italy, the land of pasta and pizza, and Italian food is my favorite food in general. Maybe I’ll decide to suffer on the days I’m not teaching.

Monica Fava, my Italian publisher picked me up in Bologna and drove me to my hotel, where I was able to take a little nap, just enough to get me through a lovely evening having  home-cooked lasagna meal by Monica’s friend and fellow Three Principles coach and Italian author, Simona  (I hope I have her name right) and her family. By the time I got back to my Hotel I was so exhausted I could barely function.