The GO FOR IT Gene & Exploring Bali
- lydshatton
- Aug 14
- 15 min read
Updated: Sep 4
A Spirit’s Journey into Healing the Unknown
In this blog you'll discover:
The GO FOR IT Gene
On an early dark night last November, I stood in my kitchen feeling dizzy, shallowly breathing while listening to my mother on speakerphone. She had just bought a ticket for me to join her on a two-week cruise in Southeast Asia in February. Singapore to Hong Kong.
Including a stop at my #1 bucket list place on the planet: Angkor Wat in Cambodia. WOW. I gripped the kitchen counter hard while she spoke. She had talked about it earlier in the fall—I just kept nodding my head.
As life goes however, from time to time, unexpected windows open and opportunities are presented for adventure. This was a major gift from my 92-year-old mother, who wanted to treat all five of her kids to cruises—mine was the third.
I looked out the dark windows, my heart racing, my brain quickly calculating what needed to happen to make the trip real.
At the same time, I felt an intuitive nudge—“Go to Bali.”
Until my mom started talking about the trip, Bali had never crossed my mind. The intuitive messages of “Go to Bali” started floating in from time to time, like a bird landing on a tree branch in front of me. I’d shoo them away out of my mind. I didn’t want to feel let down or unworthy should such a grandiose plan not come to pass.
Bali? Me? Really?
The idea felt like I was trying on a wild print dress with tassels, and I don’t wear dresses. So, ending the call with my mom, I immediately reached for my computer to look at how to get to Bali from Hong Kong and thought, well, since I am over there…
That cold November night I was freaking out. How far could I travel? How long could I be gone? Do I go blindly on a solo adventure to Bali after the cruise? Or do I ask a close friend to go with me? Could I possibly eat, pray, and love too, in Bali?
A wild new frontier had appeared with a big question mark floating above it. How daring we choose to be in these moments is completely up to us. They are significant pivot points, that much I recognized.
In the following weeks, a surge of “GO FOR IT” energy coursed through my body in a way I hadn’t felt in a long time. “Hands in the air and I don’t care” filled my heart, though it was more than that.
I knew I was being guided in some manner to go to Bali.
When we sense we are being guided by our heart, a higher power, or a deep inner knowing, certainty begins to fill in the holes of our doubts. We press ahead, step by step. The “what ifs” dissolve away as the wispy pull of inner guidance calms our nerves.
In my opinion, “Go For It” is an attitude lying in wait inside each of us, waiting to push us beyond what we know. When it swings around fully powered for takeoff, it must be seized.
So, I followed my intuition and made plans to go to Bali for three weeks after the cruise with my mother to see what was there to be discovered. I called my sister Tracey to see if she’d like to join me in Bali, and after thinking about it for several days, I got a text back from her saying, “F yes, I’m in!.” Spinning circles of excitement, I screamed, “Yes! Yes!”. There was the “Go For It” attitude again! Bali had begun moving from idea into form.
When I boarded the cruise ship Encore on February 4th in Singapore, my mom had already been on the boat for two weeks touring islands in the South China Sea to the east. Instantly, I got a full view of where
...some of my “Go For It” genes came from—her.
“Blaze,” as she is known to our family, was already well known on the 600-passenger ship when I arrived.
She zipped around with her walker, got on and off small boats and buses for full-day excursions, went to all the lectures on board, and had the nightly cruise dinner protocol down.
She’d be on the bus at 7 a.m. for a land tour—get back on the boat by 6 p.m. to dress for dinner at an assigned table with a speaker, musician, or other notable cruise staff member—preferably one with a lot of stripes on their cuffs. The customer service team lovingly referred to her as a “stripe-chaser.” Then, she might take last call on the sky deck bar at 11 p.m. with some of the fellow cruisers. She would sleep and nap strategically during the day. And then do it all again.
For the next two weeks, I heard things like, “Your mother is amazing! I want to be like her at 92!”, “We love your mother!”, “I wish my mother was like her!” It was awe-inspiring to see her in action.
Whether it was pushing through throngs of people in 95-degree heat and 100% humidity at the Royal Palace in Bangkok, getting into a small sampan boat wearing the conical palm hat to tour in the Mekong Delta in Vietnam, or boogieing down poolside with Joe the Cruise Director sans walker at 11 p.m. at Disco Night on the ship, at 92, she is still going for it.
What a gift to have that adventure with her. Throughout the trip, I laughed, I held my breath, I held my tongue and loosened my neck thoroughly by swiveling my head side to side in complete disbelief of her every day.
As we parted ways at the airport in Hong Kong after the cruise, I’ll never forget shouting across two lanes of security, “Bye Mom! Thanks! Love you!” She waved back from her wheelchair, flanked by two airport attendants, and yelled back, “Look! I have not one, but TWO people taking great care of me!” Then she disappeared, and my sister Tracey, who had connected with us in Hong Kong, and I took off to our gate to board a plane for Bali.
Exploring Bali
Bali is known as the “Island of the Gods” for those who attune to its spiritual heritage. And there is good reason for it. Roughly 20,000 temples can be found on the island, and it has a long history as a spiritual center for 84% of the population, who are Hindu.
Spiritualism permeates the daily culture in Bali. Walled-in family compounds have their own temples within for worship, in addition to their local town temples, religious sites, and other sacred areas. Offerings to the gods, comprised of small square palm frond trays filled with incense, orange marigolds, assorted flowers, green grasses, and sweet candies are found on sidewalks, in front of businesses, around homes, or inside restaurants.
The people are kind, gentle, and live very simply in comparison to the western world. It is HOT, and life is slow.
Located 8 degrees below the equator in the Indonesian islands, Bali has a diverse terrain spanning tropical beaches, jungles, rice fields, farmland, and steep wooded hills extending upward to the 10,000 ft. peak of its active volcano, Mt. Agung. Bali is about the size of Delaware and Rhode Island combined, though if you think it’s a quick ride anywhere—travel is slow, with roads in need of major repair and traffic congestion becoming extreme. Mopeds rule the roads in Bali.
Our first week there, Tracey and I explored the eastern beaches and visited islands nearby to snorkel with turtles. Then we headed inland to Ubud, the cultural heart of Bali, well known for spiritual retreats, local arts, and Balinese culture.
On our second day in Ubud, we met Wayan, a local driver who owned a minivan-cab and provided day tours.
And that’s when things started to get interesting. In fact, “things” became unbelievable.
Every day touring with Wayan was a new adventure into the mystical side of Bali. Synchronicities, seemingly magical events, and the spiritually surreal began to happen at a rate I could never have imagined. Huge rainbows surrounded me at water temples.
Messages about where I needed to go came through during sound healing ceremonies. We discovered blue orbs, and even a “dragon-like” snake feature in my pictures during our evening photo reviews.
The mysteriously magical events became the daily fodder for our “Can you believe what happened to us yesterday?!” chatter in the van as we drove through jungles, open fields, lush green rice paddies, taking in views of the smoky-purple horizon line showing the distant mountain volcanoes.
Things would “work out” perfectly every day as though we had a special teams unit on the other side escorting us wherever we went. When something was not available, something better would be in its place.
One day, Wayan’s wife Manik joined us for a day tour—she had “heard about me,” she said, and wanted to ride along. The four of us became fast friends. Manik joined us on several trips into the countryside, shopping with local artisans, and up into the mountains to the famous Ulan Danu Bratan lakeside temple, a top photo favorite for visitors and island locals.
Manik also accompanied me into the big waterfalls on our last water temple ceremony—making sure I knew when to pray, when to scream and let go (she was doing the same), and held my hand walking barefoot across mountain streams full of sharp rocks while roaring waterfalls dropped from thirty feet overhead.
Wayan had been recommended to me by a friend as an excellent tour guide for his insider knowledge, being dialed in on the spiritual side of things, and having a kind, easy-going demeanor. His daily refrain, “All good in Ubud,” became our team motto—no matter what happened.
On our first day exploring, Tracey and I knew we had struck gold with Wayan. Wayan brought us to a tucked-away family-owned coffee plantation where we tasted 13 different coffees and teas, drove the back roads evading the tour buses so we could “fly” over the rice paddies on rope swings and zip lines, and wheeled us around steep hairpin turns into ravines to discover hidden waterfalls.
The Melukat Purification Ceremony at Bali’s Holy Water Temples
Things started to become “really interesting” our first day with Wayan when we stopped to visit a water healing temple favored by the locals called “DTW Pura Mengening.” This would be the first of four water temple visits for me (Taman Pecampuhan Sala , Tirta Empul, and Pura Taman Beji Griya were the others).
Pura Mengening dates back to the 11th century and is a significant water temple in Bali. Local inhabitants gather holy water there to take home for their own uses. Off the beaten path, the temple’s modest entrance gently coaxes you to move into another realm as you slowly descend a long curving stairway to take in beautifully terraced gardens and pools below.
We visited the main temple halfway down, looked at the areas cordoned off for the priests, and viewed the bubbling natural spring fed by a distant mountain river providing water for the temple. The dark pool of water was gently couched into the hillside and partially covered by oversized tropical leaves, as if protected from view.
Then Wayan asked if we wanted to go see the ceremonial purification pools farther below and possibly partake in the 30-minute water cleansing ceremony.
Tracey chose not to; however, I had brought my bathing suit, and I was ready for everything! Was this going to be a jump in the water, I wondered? Not exactly… by any stretch.
When one participates in the Melukat Water Purification ceremony, you have to follow a protocol. There are prayers and incense for preparation and a certain order one must follow as you journey in the water temple, from beginning to finish. At each waterspout or waterfall, there is a ritual to help you release negative energy, cleanse body, mind, and spirit while calling for release and purification. Many water temples will offer you a guide to take you through, though not all, and Wayan guided me on our first water temple visit at Pura Mengening, standing on the side while I was in the water.
To begin, Wayan and I sat in front of an offerings table where he picked up a small tray full of flowers and grass, called a "Canung Sari", just like those we had seen everywhere in town. He lit the incense in it and showed me how to begin with prayers of intention and gratitude for entering the sacred temple. I definitely felt awkward, as though there was a right way to do it although beyond me, so I smiled, gave thanks for allowing us to be there, and hoped the process would not be too complicated. I'm more of the second row gal in exercise class - I have found being visual means I need to watch others who listen better.
We got up and I followed Wayan across a small bridge closer to the ceremonial pools. In front of them are changing rooms, lockers, and a spot to pay to go into the temple waters.“Put on your bathing suit, get a colored sarong, and then I will meet you,” Wayan instructed. I stalled out staring at him as tears started welling up in my throat, and began looking around me as if lost. I had no idea where these strong feelings were coming from and was not prepared.
Wayan saw it and probably felt it, for sure. Looking right through me to the back of my eyes, reading me like a book, he asked, “Are you okay?" “I’m fine, I think. I don’t know what this is,” I told him, holding down what felt like a volcano of emotion boiling just beneath the surface in my heart. Everything seemed to quickly spin out of control, like there was about to be a blow-out I had no control over. I clamped it down. I kept moving to the changing area, wiping away tears. How did this happen, I wondered? I was fine minutes earlier.
In that moment, it was crystal clear to me Wayan was highly intuitive and a powerful healer. No hiding from him, that’s for sure, I realized, feeling even more vulnerable. Walking toward the lockers, I swore, “Shit.”
As I changed into my bathing suit, I worried about the random crying. It felt like a slow extraction from my chest was underway, pushing me to breathe deep—and I hadn’t even gone in yet. After putting on my orange sarong, Wayan took me back to the altar on the side of the cleansing pools, where he helped me light incense on another small tray offering, and we sat down on the dais again.
He looked at me and said, “This is where you make your wish.” “Wish?” I said. “Yes, this is where you make your wish—anything you want to heal, or let go of, or want more of—and also give thanks,” he said. And then we sat in silence.
I wished, prayed, and prayed even harder to let go of as much negativity, heartbreak, lost hopes, things unseen, unrealized, and unwanted, as I could. I asked for forgiveness and gave thanks—especially for my children and their protection.
We got up, and he guided me over to the spot where one enters the first purification pool. I stepped a big step down in—and went up to my neck. It was refreshing, not too cold. I gathered my footing, stood up, and didn’t know what to do next. I was nervous. Wayan said, “See that guy? Follow him.” I let go a breath of relief. I had someone to follow.
So, I went to the left waterspout following instructions, as Wayan was demonstrating—cup your hands, three sips of water, spit it out, then three rinses over the head, three on the face, then let the water run over your head from the spout—as long as you want. Move along the spouts to the right and repeat the process.
Next, I had to go into the pool with spouts on the opposite side, do the same process, asking for clearing and giving thanks. When done, I looked up to Wayan for direction, eyeing the loud water coming down through the tropical greenery and bouncing out of a rocky canal into the pool over to my right. “Hold yourself in there as long as you can,” he told me, pointing at the waterfall. I looked up at him with uncertainty, slowly wading over to the gushing water, and he yelled, “Do you know how lucky you are?” I thought, well, yes, I am here—this is amazing.
“What do you mean?” I shouted back. “There is no one in this waterfall pool with you! I have never seen this in my life,” he shouted. “Oh! Ok!” I answered, while thinking, "No one? Huh." Tracey shook her head and laughed as she watched. I hoped there wasn't energetic gunk oozing out of me so much so that other people were keeping away. Wayan kept mumbling about it, laughing and shaking his head in disbelief as I got out of the water, having been pounded by G-force waterfall power.
After changing, Wayan took me back to the offerings dais one last time, where we said a final prayer of thanks, and he reached into a tray to put a small clump of white sticky rice on my third eye between my eyebrows, marking I had completed my supplications.
Sitting in the back seat of the van on the way home, I felt like I’d just had the best massage in my life—my wet curly hair glued flat against my head, rice stuck to my forehead—wondering how long the mellow feelings of elation, peace, and happiness would last.
The sharp painful emotions boiling over in my chest earlier had been completely
washed out of me. I was now happy, tired, lightheaded, and lighthearted all at once. It is possible to get hooked on the spiritual water temples of Bali, I decided, if that was
always the result.
The WHY for Bali: The Beyond Self
As the magical days passed with Tracey, Wayan, and Manik wandering the villages, temples, and far reaches of the countryside together or separately in Wayan’s van, I came to understand most of why I had been guided to go to Bali:
To be put in the direct path of spiritual and emotional healing in one of the most powerful spots on the planet.
To experience synchronous living and loving motion away from any routine or expectation borne from my day-to-day life.
To free me to feel life in my heart in a way that had been clouded and out of reach.
To trust myself and my inner guidance at a level I had yet to embrace.
To listen. To try.
To keep GOING FOR IT.
I went, scared, worried what others might think.
Yet I did it anyway.
I am still seeing more of the WHY continue to unfold in my day-to-day life back home. The rewards have been endless.
However, the one lesson of LISTENING AND TRUSTING my inner guidance is hardwired in me forever.
There are other places people will go under the guise of healing and spiritual tourism, for sure, but I didn’t go to Bali specifically for that—I had no idea what was going to unfold.
Bali was the place I needed to go.
The place I needed to be to shift out of old patterns and energies holding me in ways I could not understand.
A place where I could rise to another level of awareness about my deep spiritual nature and experience living with people who live and lead with spirit every day.
A place to be immersed in the sacred most everywhere I looked.
A place where healing and spiritual progress is an intramural sport—especially when you include G-force waterfalls.
We need mind, body, and spirit to all be engaged at different points and in different modalities to bring us closer to our true center and up to a higher version of ourselves. So many of us hold back from turning inward and saying, YOUR TURN.
We take care of everything other than our deepest and most needed healing for transformation—whether we are aware of it does not mean it is not there, waiting.
We choose not to listen to our inner wisdom and guidance out of fear of what others might think.
I also know now that choosing to do it anyway offers untold rewards.
Especially, when the potential result is our “Beyond Self.”
The one who is whispering intuitive messages and nudging us forward.
The one who is waiting on the other side of “Go For It.”
Now is the time.
Be kind to yourself.
Much Love,
Lydia
P.S. Giving thanks to:
My mom, Tracey, Wayan, and Manik and many others who flew in alongside me are a pointed reminder that the Divine works THROUGH people, not TO people.
I am eternally grateful to you all.
Mom—thanks for launching the magic carpet to Southeast Asia. I love you. I don’t know if you knew about my deep spiritual nature before I did, but you sure do now! Your “Go For It” attitude has inspired thousands beyond your five children. At 92, you continue to enable people, one way or the other, to stretch and reach beyond their known limits.
And Tracey—I am so grateful for your sisterhood. You are one of the most generous and funny people I know. You increased the power and impact of the trip to Bali by a factor of ten. From keeping everyone laughing in hysterics to reflecting back events through the lens of your wisdom—I am forever grateful for your loving impact on us all.
Lydia Hatton, MBA, is a Clinical Hypnotherapist and Mindset Coach who lives in Spring Lake, Michigan - near many great lakes. She inspires crowds with her talks on how to 10X Your Power By Harnessing the Power of the Subconscious Mind. More photos and reels from Bali can be found on her Instagram Feed, LydiaHatton,MBA
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