Wanderlust
I promise I don't want to run from my problems next year. I will bring them with me!
Have you seen those reels on IG that ask what the best view you’ve seen in 2022 is, and then everyone has all these incredible videos of exotic locations and stunning cliffside sunsets? Those gave me FOMO feels today when I realized that I didn’t really take in any stunning views from traveling this year.
2022 was supposed to be the year I reclaimed myself. It was supposed to be the year I got back to adventure. My journeys were supposed to leave footprints in the sands of the desert and beaches, not a sunken spot in my couch that perfectly matches the size of my ass where it curls up when I take a nap.
If I didn’t know me, my camera roll would convince me I spent this year doing a whole lot of nothing except sleeping and feeling sorry for myself, saved by the occasional kiddo snuggle and very few & rare moments of happy adult interaction.
I am a big believer in the enneagram. It’s really helped me learn a lot about myself the last few years. No matter how many times I’ve taken the test, I’ve always come out a type 7 (wing 8)- “The Enthusiast.” We 7s are known for our insatiable thirst for adventure and changing scenery. This makes us sound like we were born as TheMostFun kind of people, but it turns out we’re mostly trauma survivors who use fantasy and escapism to run from any feelings of pain or discomfort.
This is my favorite free enneagram test if you’re curious what your number is.
So, you see, a year of NOT running away from myself, not distracting myself with travel or serious relationships or a highly successful career, meant a year of really fucking hard work that I hated most of the time, but that made a huge impact on my personal growth. I mean, I spent a solid year just feeling uncomfortable as fuck, letting all my ugly, painful emotions come out. DESPISED IT. Highly recommend.
I absolutely would have traveled if I had the money, but there was, also, a solid 3-4 month depressive episode thrown in there, thus the lack of a highly successful career.
Anyway, a win’s a win.
So I don’t have any pics or videos of stunning views from my travels in 2022. Whatever. What I do have are stunning views of my own healing.
But I would like to petition the universe or whomever to please let me onto the 2023 Stunning Views Of PLACES roster of people. I promise I will take my inner child with me, and we can even let ourselves feel uncomfortable under a starry sky in Iceland. I will meditate and journal on the beach. I will cry about my anxious attachment wounds on the plane. I don’t care.
I am ready to take this healing on the road, God!
That is NOT ME TRYING TO RUN FROM MY PROBLEMS. I WILL BRING THEM WITH ME! I would just like to work through them in various other pretty places with stunning views in 2023. Please and thank you.
Don't sell yourself short 2: "thus the lack of a highly successful career." Maybe not a highly *paid* career, but I think you accomplish more with your open, raw, vulnerable writing than someone with a highly-compensated pretty picture career. You move people. You change people's lives. I'm sure you have saved someone's life. If that isn't successful, I don't know what is.
I feel it in my bones that the world is waiting for you two to show up and work through shit with a cliffside, Mediterranean view.