288 Days
Since I’ve begun to share my newest ‘project’, I’ve been called:
Brave. Crazy. Admirable. I’ve received questionable glances and nods of slight disapproval. I’ve received excitement and well-wishes.
How am I feeling? Honestly, it depends on the moment 😂
Excited.
Anxious.
Excited.
Overwhelmed.
I’ve got this.
Holy crap, I’ll never be ready.
I can’t wait to go.
I think I made the wrong choice.
My own emotional pendulum swings back and forth. With a 288 day journey ahead of me and 7 weeks remaining stateside, I’ve decided I’m ready to open up and invite you into my world.
No doubt you’re having your own reactions as you read this letter and find out I’m embarking on a world-schooling trip with my two children from August 2024 through May 2025.
😱 Yep. That’s about nine months abroad, on the road, with five families (that I don’t really know yet) and a teacher traveling through Southeast and Central Asia.
Let me rewind back to January 1 of this year. I scribbled in my journal a word for the year - wait for it - Adventure (see proof above). 🎒 👀
Did you just gasp? I most definitely did when I realized that what I had been seeking was seeking me as well.
When this experience fell into my lap, I heard an instinctual “be careful what you wish for.” But the reality of dreaming big gets to sound more like “get ready for what you wish for.”
Here’s the thing about any dream. It’s new. And that comes with discomfort. When you look at discomfort with all the negative what ifs, it feels scary. It feels like it’s going to be painful. But when you look at discomfort as growth, it can feel a whole lot different.
✨ It starts to feel right more than it feels wrong.
✨ You start to feel ready more than you feel ill-equipped.
New territory of any kind, geographic, emotional, physical, means making what will probably feel like missteps. If you’re like me, you’ll probably second guess yourself here and there and wonder if you’re making the ‘best’ choice. But I keep being presented with the lesson that it’s all for me. Even when it doesn’t feel like it. (I’m not immune to the “why is this happening to me” line of thinking”.) Even when I don’t understand it. I look back on my life and it most definitely has all been for me.
I’m inviting you along this journey that has most certainly has already started changing me. And that alone is something a little magical. Isn’t it fascinating that simply making a new choice changes you?!
I’m doing the daily dance between planning and surrender. Between expectation and enjoying the ride. I’ll be sharing tactics, strategy, mindset on how to approach even the most complex things in life with simplicity and intention.
I hope you’ll join me on the ups and the unexpected, on the excitement and likely homesickness, through what I expect will also be the adventure of a lifetime.
Most of all, I hope this inspires you to keep dreaming and to prepare for your dream. It’s looking for you so, make sure you’re tuned in and recognize it when it comes knocking. Because, trust me, it’s out there looking for you.
