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What a great question, and such a lovely, soul-nudging post, Shelly!

"Does where you live make you braver?"

I never thought about the connection between courage and the place where we live...

Just returned from a holiday in the Algarve, where we met a couple from Colorado (he is from Denver, she originally from Montana) looking for the landscape of their souls... in Portugal...

Courage, I guess, also is connected with familiarity, with what comes easy to us. When it feels scary to others, they think it's 'brave'... The funny thing is, courage doesn't always feel like courage, when it's 'perfectly normal' to us.

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Such a small world to be meeting folks from Colorado seeking their soul landscape in Portugal. My sister and son both resonates a lot with Portugal—I wonder what the vibe is that feels soul-familiar? I hope to find out someday. I’m thinking even more about courage from landscapes, the metaphors of nature. Thanks for pondering with me. :)

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Thanks Shelly! Beautiful pictures and writing. What is the landscape of my soul? I will live into that question. Metaphor. Goosebumps. I came across this quote from Canadian poet Don McKay, “metaphor’s first act is to un-name its subject.”

Place and soul. I can only say that I hear myself loudest in the forest. What is that deeper voice? I have no words for it. What are poets for? To un-name the landscape of our soul? Maybe language can never hold the feeling your beautiful pictures and landscape know.

Bless you! Keep writing. We need you.

🙏❤️

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Thank you so much, Jamie. Great thoughts and quite about metaphor. I agree that sometimes we only need images! Some landscapes do leave me speechless!

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Aug 28Liked by Shelly L Francis

Such a lovely read Shelly, and thank you for the double shout-out. I’m really looking forward to listening to the podcast. As for Dakota, I’m really enjoying reading that too! There’s a wonderful chapter on hope I’m planning to write about at some point. I love her writing style too. Thank you for making me aware of it. I wasn’t aware of your book Damocles’ Wife. I would love to read that too. Thanks as always for your generosity is sharing such courageous content. It’s content I need to read 🙏❤️

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You're so welcome. Paying forward all the generosity of what you post is my pleasure! :)

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