Like many others, we long dreamed of moving to the top of Georgia. Leave the city, suburbs, or job behind and start another chapter. Most folks relocating here enjoy making great new friends while enjoying awesome views amid peace, beauty, cool air, and clean water.

A trickle for decades, our mountain migration appears to be keeping up the astonishing pace set after the 2020 census. Such new beginnings are tipping points—we either launch into an invigorating trajectory or sputter along the very same path, but with nicer scenery.

Perhaps, like looking for love, it’s a matter of cultivating the objective on the inside before it can appear on the outside. A kind of be the forest you want to see thing?

We need, we want. We’re endlessly seeking. Imagining the affordable cabin in the mountains or the completing partner, but comfort is closer than that. Behind a long-closed door is the opportunity to get acquainted with our own restorative inner space and its light-filled views.

Don’t just peek. Wander around in there once or twice a day. Think of it as quiet reflection, meditation, or calling home. Getting to know you can relieve some of those running-on-empty sensations that drive us to scrounge for satisfaction.

Sometimes, a bit of loneliness manages to settle over us whether we’re at the center of a busy family, in a long-term relationship, or spending every workday navigating a sea of clients, patients, or students. And, sometimes, “being there” can be depleting—triggering us to imagine our solace awaits beside a mountain stream or with a kindred soul.

Emotional isolation can spark the question “Who’s there for me?” which often leaves the most connected people you know without an answer.

What if life is not so much about finding who or what “completes me,” at all?  Maybe we have more than enough understanding, strength, and genuine love within us to light up the world whenever we’re ready.

People who go through their days with quiet confidence, an easy-going attitude, and generously caring hearts seem to tap that resource. They’re radiant, aren’t they? It’s as though their interactions with others fuel that grace within rather than deplete it.

Discovering that we survive shedding the veneer we’ve spent decades building—the high achieving, validation gathering, career persona—might dawn on us atop windswept Brasstown Bald. But it can happen in our MARTA seat on any day’s commute. Whether in quiet visualizations or among these gentle old mountains, we can allow trailside trees and rushing creeks to lift away the last layers until one day our brilliant inner core glimmers through, leaving us the radiant and abundantly loving creatures we were meant to be, wherever we’re meant to be. Completed.