Reflections After A Road Trip
Recently returning from a road trip to the Victorian high country, I've collected a few reflections.
1) Play is important for an adult just as it is for children. On the trip, I felt alive, refreshed and euphoric from spontaneity, allowing my inner child to roam free in the physical world without responsibility. As an adult, not every single action needs to be goal-oriented, productive and rationalised. Some memories include: drawing, building towers from Jenga blocks, improvised story narration based on present reality (e.g., horror movie plot when I was driving down pitch dark road) and exploring novel areas.
2) Reconnecting with our inner voice is important for guidance and balance. Through unconscious conditioning and floods of never-ending streams of information bombarding our minds, it can be difficult to find ourselves in the noise. One way I've recalibrated my nervous system and healed my gut-brain connection is through disconnecting from the technology and urban world, and intentionally allowing time to exist in physical space with no distractions. Watching my thoughts float by, making mental notes of notable ideas to explore in-depth, coexisting with emotions without suppressing them and decluttering junk.
3) Unmasking in this world requires nurtured audacity, a skill that must be trained, and a leap of faith to be taken. Swimming upstream is no easy feat, and significant exertion is required when waters threaten to drown and push me down an undesired path. However, locking in the choice to determine my own narrative and reject the story presented about “being normal” to fit a mold reaps rewards living in the shackles of fear and rejection can only imagine. Growing more comfortable with my mortality, and accepting that the end can come with unpredictability, I live with less “what ifs” and more embracing life through trial, error, failure and learning. On my deathbed, whenever that is, the worst-case anxiety spirals have no value to me, only the regret of not living at all.