My brother and I traveled to Hilton Head Island for a family vacation last year. As we set out from Pennsylvania, he told me about a place along the road that had a beautiful view of a vast part of the American landscape. The weather was quite cloudy and as we entered Virginia, we realized that the vista we hoped to see would be shrouded in mist.
"I want beautiful, sunny weather and clear skies, so that we can see the view!" That was my wish, which I said out loud, and I even convinced my brother to say it out loud, too.
He wasn't exactly sure of the location of the Scenic Overlook, so we both kept an eagle eye out for the sign at the side of the road. However, two things happened as we approached the area where he was fairly sure he had seen it. First, the skies cleared completely, and we were driving in the most beautiful, sunny weather. Second, we hit a snag. The highway narrowed and was quite choked with traffic due to construction. After some time, we decided that things had slowed down to such a crawl that we were going to take an alternate route. Goodbye, Scenic Overlook!
Remember… "Be careful how you wish!" We wished for clear skies, but we forgot to wish for clear roads and a visit to the Scenic Overlook. It’s as if the Universe heard us loud and clear on the weather of our wish, but we didn’t articulate the actual outcome we desired - to visit the Scenic Overlook that my brother remembered.
You can look at “be careful how you wish” as a variation of “be careful what you wish for.” We don’t recommend complicated, lengthy wishes, like “I want nice weather AND clear traffic conditions AND so on and so forth.” What we recommend is to put the focus on the outcome and, lately, we’ve been adding a phrase we like that one of our fellow wishers, Mike Dooley uses, “... or better.”
So Barbara’s wish should’ve been:
“I want to see and photograph the vast landscape of this part of the USA from the Scenic Overlook… or better.”
Next week, our post will be in our FAQs Section, “Why Does Spring Make Me Want to Revisit My Wish List?”
Until then,
Peace and All Good
Margie and Barbara
The Wish Mavens
Photo Credit
The photo featured in this post was taken by (and is copyrighted by) Margaret A. Herrick.