SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA—It’s that time of the year when I attend my annual grief conference and get time off for myself and fulfill items on my travel bucket list. The first stop is always to one of my “thin places.”

No, it’s not a place where one goes on a perennial diet, or one inhabited by thin people. Thin places, according to a recent New York Times article by Eric Weiner, are “where the distance between heaven and earth collapses, and we’re able to catch glimpses of the divine.”

Weiner says that travel to thin places doesn’t necessarily translate into spiritual breakthroughs, but “it does disorient and confuses. We lose our bearings, and find new ones. Or not. Either way, we are jolted out of old ways of seeing the world, and therein lies the transformative magic of travel.”

Sacredness, Weiner says, is a quality possessed by a thin place. However, it need not be tranquil, beautiful or fun, though it can also possess those qualities. “You don’t plan a trip to a thin place; you stumble upon one…and for starters, have no expectations. One person’s thin place, may be another person’s thick one.”

Airports, temples, places of worship, a restaurant tucked away in some quiet corner on a busy street are examples of thin places.

On my solo flights, my airline seat, provided that my seatmate is not obnoxious, has often been my thin place. There, in the quiet, seated alone with my thoughts 36,000 feet above the air, I am able to listen to my heart, and feel close to God. On a 12-hour flight, there is a lot of time to think and reflect about one’s life and all that one has been through.

But even a seatmate, with an interesting story to tell, can add even deeper meaning to an encounter, making the shared space even thinner.

On the flight here, I met a Filipina nurse from one of San Francisco’s top cancer centers. In her early 40s, she had decided to return to her roots after a 20-year absence. Near midlife, I saw parts of myself as I listened to her stories and questions. My new friend was on the cusp of both an exciting and confusing time in her life. She told me about how she returned to the places of her youth and grieved when she found that most of them were now gone.

As the hours passed, she told me about her brother who had died suddenly and about losing her dad a year and a half before that. “You would think,” she began, “that because you are a nurse (in Oncology, at that) that you would find loss easier to accept and bear because you see it so regularly in your work.”

Before we knew it, the 11-and-a-half-hour journey to San Francisco just flew by. A new friendship had been born out of a thin place.

The Ferry Building in San Francisco is another thin place, one that I discovered serendipitously three years ago.

Today, I walked down Market Street under vibrant blue San Francisco skies with a dear friend who shared that the wooden benches at the back of the Ferry Building overlooking the water of San Francisco Bay were her thin place, too.

Basking in the gentle rays of the afternoon sun, we nibbled our rose-geranium macaroons bought from a dainty little pastry shop called Miette’s, as we sipped warm Oolong tea from Peet’s. And once more, time flew by as we traded both sentiment and sympathy. It’s true what Weiner wrote, that in a thin place, our relationship with time is altered and softened. He added, “Time is not something we feel compelled to parse or hoard. There’s plenty of it to go around.”

On this journey I’m traveling much lighter, having left Manila with one suitcase, determined to return with only one. I told my friend that this year it will be about investing and making memories. It’s about having no expectations and simply allowing each day to unfold. To pay more attention to everything and everyone, staying fully present in every moment given.

And because God is in the details, I am certain that this journey will be about discovering more of the Divine, of finding grace and miracles in every person I meet, in words spoken, in all the places, experiences and encounters that have yet to be.

Game-changer

I would like to express my gratitude to Spot.ph for putting me on the list of “10 Women Who Changed The Game.” I am deeply honored to be part of this group that includes the late Doreen Fernandez, Edith Tiempo, Jessica Cox, Raissa Laurel, Winnie Monsod and Patricia Evangelista. I am deeply honored and moved because it gives much more meaning to the ministry and work I continue to do in the area of grief education and counseling after Migi’s death, even many years after.

E-mail [email protected]. Follow her on Twitter @cathybabao.