It’s not where you are or what you are doing, but knowing who you truly are while you are doing it, and where you happen to be.
The look into what happens when you stay put?
I think these pictures summarize my months since coming home from abroad very nicely. It’s not as if I am sitting in one place twiddling my thumbs, although this is indeed how it feels a good portion of the time. I’ve managed to get out, explore, experience new things, and begin new hobbies.
Backpacking in the north woods of Minnesota, becoming an avid amateur rock climber, consuming some…alcoholic beverages along the way, watching the seasons change, becoming an acting pillow for two cats, and some familial love as well. I’ve even managed to get control of my students over the past couple of months, falling into a routine in school, that doesn’t get me bogged down, and spending copious hours running around trying to piece lessons together, instead, it takes minutes now opposed to hours. Writing has stuck and continued to be a daily exercise of mental health, and I’ve even attempted the dating scene, much to my dismay.
So why do these experiences feel so different than previous? It’s about pursuing your true self, and amongst travels, routines, and simple life, somewhere along the way, your personality, identity, and self-grows, right? The experiences mold you into who you want to be as you continue to learn and relearn what you hold dear, what you deem important, what’s worth spending your time on and decidedly sculpt your life’s work around. Can’t this be viable while in one place? While enjoying all that is around us each and every day that we seemingly miss or don’t soak in and see
So, why then do so many of us have this so-called Wanderlust? Why is just being, sometimes not good enough? Why do we have to travel, to see? Why not appreciate what is and see all the good that we can do around us, where we live, where the family may be, where our routines are paramount and ground us in our ways?
I would argue because it keeps us on our toes. By being immersed in different cultures, and traveling to different places it resets our clocks, it makes the day-to-day manageable and allows for hours of thinking to take place of what we experienced on our newest venture. By being a part of other places, it seems as if it is making us be better humans by knowing more, by sorting through the good and the bad, by experience, rather than 2nd hand knowledge.
My goal is to be. To be content in the cold winter, the darkened day, and open my eyes to all the little things we miss each and every day. However, I also agree that we should get out, explore, see, and bring back all that you are able to learn no matter where you may find yourself.
Let’s put it into practice and see where the road may lead, where the decisive or not so decisive day-to-day decisions lead me, lead us, lead you. Lead us to where we believe we should be right now.
