I AM NOT A SOLO TRAVELER

I do not find solitude to be comforting and I do not long for an escape. I cannot be bothered with carrying a backpack and meeting new people. I respect people who meditate for hours and manage to step away from their busy minds. I cannot, for the life of me, pull that off.

If I am not thinking.. I am not! And though in my 20s this used to be a good thing, a great thing even, in my 30’s it’s not. This restless commotion of my thoughts has been a great  survival tool, for it’s the foundation of my creative writings and productivity. But if my “survival mode” has been switched on for 32 years now, when will my “living mode” starts operating?

If I am always surviving, when do I live?

DESTINATION: WHATEVER..

15 August 2016: My Monday checklist reached Tuesday’s sheet, which was not comforting one bit. I don’t mind work but this Monday came with a different vibe, so I asked my best friend what’s wrong with me and I listed all my symptoms: shortage of breath, don’t feel productive, my mind is all over the place, feeling down, lazy and sleepy all the time..

My best friend, whose name is google, came back to me with a series of links that might help me, some suggested I was in love, others suggested I was sick, some suggested serious physical illness, others psychological.. On page 4 of google search ( because I no longer trust page 1, its too mainstream), there was a travel suggestion. Now we’re talking.

So google said I need a trip, where to, I wonder? most importantly, when? I knew there was no way I could leave anytime before November due to work commitment. So I was shooting for December. I know some friends who usually travel for new year’s so I can check with them and join. But wait, what’s this.. Travel and volunteering..sounds like an ok combination.

From one link to another, I found volunteerinbali.org, an organization that helps underprivileged kids in remote villages in Bali learn english through volunteer travelers. Without thinking about it, I sent them an email, and with the last click to send I went on to continue my checklist on one other manic Monday.

THIS IS NOT A JOKE

When I received a confirmation email from Ketut, the founder of the NGO, I was so busy with work that my mind decided to classify it as spam. So for a couple of weeks the whole idea of traveling just died. But this is what we always do, we decide to make a change and we do a bit of research, read an ample amount of articles and already feel better because we took the first step. Then we go back to doing what we do.

We’re bigger fans of the “Concept of making a change” rather than actually making it. We read about “10 things to do before your 40s” and ” 5 things to do right now to make you happy” and ” 10 places to visit before you die”.. We get super excited and start highlighting stuff that we insist on doing and habits we want to change, we bookmark the website and feel like we achieved something big..And it ends there.

One article might entice you to make a change or do something different, but to take action you need to be in a place where nothing will help but this one thing. Taking action becomes mandatory for survival, and we are masters of survival.

I went back to this email when I was on the verge of breaking down again; I updated and booked my travel dates and my teaching days. That was September 13, 2016.

Whether we live to survive or survive to live we cannot but owe our survival mode a great deal.

So Let’s do ourselves a favor..Let’s Survive