“To live is to experience things, not sit around pondering the meaning of life.” – Paulo Coelho from ‘Aleph’

What are we looking for? 
What am I looking for? 
I’ve created the life of my dreams — why did I so desperately feel the need to escape it and get away? 

Something about travel feels like a drug to me. Going somewhere new where you don’t know anything — the language, the streets, the people, the smells, the weather, the food. It’s truly psychedelic if you can relish in losing yourself, releasing your ego and slowing-the-fuck-down to take it all in.

All we have is time. 

Money is only ever changing digits in the bank but we base our purpose around it, and thus our work/money ends up becoming everything to us; our purpose, our reason for joy or sadness, for many — it’s our reason for waking up in the morning. But this is an illusion to keep us from happiness. To keep us distracted, unhappy, working, sick, medicated; and repeat — all in hopes of possibly affording an annual vacation or a spa day to find the elusive “happiness” because that’s exactly where it is (not). Meanwhile pharma companies and CEOs get wealthier at the expense of our lives; the only gift we were actually given. 

The only reality is time, and that it is passing. 

I had the observation that I like to punish myself — I take the harder way, I think if I do it the harder way well then I’ll at least do it “right.” Or maybe it’s a subconscious self-loathing that makes me feel undeserving of joy; am I assisting this thief of joy? Am I the thief? Maybe that’s what I have to figure out on this journey. I know a lot of it is how we’re raised and I was raised by two paranoid immigrant parents who feared a lot, but with good reason; however their life is not mine, and even they made it out abundantly — but happily, I cannot confirm. 

This morning in my beautiful Trieste hotel room, I should have gotten up and out and had breakfast somewhere nice, packed my bag and left the hotel for my next destination. Instead, I woke up and worried and slowly gathered my things and planned my morning routine repeatedly, I took a taxi to the bus station and showed up an hour and a half early to make sure I found my way. Now I’m killing an hour sitting at a cafe at said bus station for said bus to arrive. 

I don’t think the lack of pleasure is isolated to me or how I was raised. As Americans are born and raised in a haze of hustle, competition, keeping up, living-up-to-our-potential and a pride-of-ownership tied to consumerism and capitalism, it’s unnatural. I’ll say it again, it’s NOT natural. We think we are our possessions and to be without them, or alone; maybe that’s part of the 90% of our brains we don’t use. Or is it deeper; a subconscious self-loathing where I find problems instead of relishing in the moment, for fear of losing something beautiful that I may have found?

We struggle to be idle or alone. And truly — idle or alone. No phone, no television, no distractions — just watching time pass and being content with the absurd beauty all around us. That is something I really hope to do on this adventure. Be awe-fully content with simply being.

I find fluttering moments of delight when I think to myself, “oh wow, look at that” stumbling upon something ordinary or remarkable I had never slowed down to notice before. From something as simple as a flower or sunset to something extraordinary — it doesn’t matter, there’s incredible beauty all around us – this should be enough to bring us happiness, awe and an inspired life. 

We don’t learn what happiness looks like, but we spend our lives trying to find it. Is it finding the perfect partner, having children, getting your dream job (definitely not), and it’s not possessions. It’s moments. It’s mere fleeting moments, but you have to make yourself available for them. The idea of doing things harder, but doing them “right” is the same punishing ourselves in advance to avoid some greater unknown we are afraid of; no doubt anticipating. Getting it “right” is less important than showing up and being present.

I used to solo travel a lot when I was single. This is my first solo trip now that I’ve been married a few years and I realized how quickly I wanted to go back to my partner and the comforts of home. But back at home, I was thrilled in anticipation to take this solo trip — the desire, the need, it was beyond me. My heart was demanding me to learn something or experience something or get a fresh perspective, only time will tell. 

Yesterday I came into Trieste and it’s a beautiful sleepy town on the East coast of Italy. It’s dynamic here in the sense that you’re in Italy but it’s very Austro-Hungarian formerly belonging to the ever-powerful Habsburg family. I got here and was eager to get out of my sweaty shirt after walking to my hotel, carrying my backpack the whole way. I treated myself to the nicest hotel and a sea front room, and thought — alas, I get to relax. I changed my shirt, saw some sites then came back to the room to relax, I mean, work. 

Work on what? I’m recently unemployed which is why I have time to take this excursion. Well, I was working on finding more work — I had to respond to interview requests and set them up for Monday evening all in one cluster. Then I distracted myself with lies about how it was too cold to go out, or that I don’t enjoy night life and I stayed in binging television on my laptop until I fell asleep. I don’t regret not going out, I saw the beauty of the evening from my balcony. During the day I did explore the sleepy town, most everything was closed. I’ve come to find that quite usual living in the Europe — stores being closed, all the time, outside of store hours or even for seasons at a time. European merchants aren’t as consumer-focused as Americans are; stores close for hours or seasons, leaving money behind, but it doesn’t matter to them because they’ve planned for it and they are able to enjoy their downtime. 

Now, at the same cafe awaiting my bus, I see an older man sitting at a bar tabletop with his dog on a leash. His dog wants to play and is pawing and nibbling at his owner’s rubber boots. His playfulness lit me up from the inside out and I couldn’t help but think that was the most adorable moment — and if I weren’t here, taking things slowly, I would have missed that sweet moment and seeing this beautiful, playful dog that I will never see again. 

I’m not sure if there’s a word for it, but my brain thinks in song and sings songs on repeat before I’ve consciously processed my own feelings. It just happens all the time. I’ve always thought in song.

Two songs on repeat, in my head this morning:
1. Whitney Houston’s Greatest Love of All 
2. “When You’re Smiling” – done by several folks including Nat King Cole, Frank Sinatra, Louis Armstrong and Billie Holiday.

As I sang Whitney’s song, she says: “The greatest love of all, is easy to achieve. Learning to love yourself, it is the greatest love of all.” She’s right about it being the greatest love of all, but the easy to achieve part I’m less certain.

The other song reminded me the world is a mirror — and I need to make use of my joy, for myself and for others. A world smiling with me would be a wonderful feeling. 

Trieste is know as the coffee capital of the world. It also has the largest sea-facing plaza in all of Europe. It was beautiful, here are some snaps I was able to capture from the canals to the balcony view I loved so much. 

Next up, Slovenia. 

#travel