I recently met a couple traveling in their tiny trailer with an underpowered truck pulling it - just like me! We shared stories of the trip to here and the disasters that happened on the way. We were all laughing - now - but it wasn't really very funny while they were happening. But it felt good to laugh and even more so to know I wasn't alone in my adventure disasters! This got me thinking about this whole trip and how it has really made me have to s t r e t c h out of my comfort zone and deal with very little of what I planned and much more of what I didn't plan on!
Before the last year in preparation for leaving my old world and life, the four years before that were pretty consistent in my day to day living. The journey was much more of an internal one at that time, my external world required very little of me to respond to it.
But part of adjusting to big change, crisis, and disasters (or unplanned adventures depending on your perspective) is trusting you CAN deal with them. One of the reasons I think the first few weeks were so hard for me was that I was long out of practice having to manage any type of crisis beyond what I wanted for dinner that night.
Anyone who specializes in crisis management - fire, police, military, search and rescue - also practices crisis management. They drill again and again when it's not a crisis so that when it is, they can respond without getting lost in the emotion and fear. It is much the same as an athlete who trains for their big event.
If your normal life doesn't really allow for much unplanned adventure, maybe it's time to shake things up a bit? The goal isn't to win rather it is to just get acclimated to having to deal with a change and uncertainty and then trusting you will be able to problem solve your way out of it.
Fear is really something we push into the future by imagining what may happen. But the past usually reveals that no matter what has come upon us, we managed to deal with it in some way. It is the fear that is paralyzing more than any event or experience that comes upon us.
So what kind of adventure can you embark on? It doesn't have to be life changing like me - you know, throwing everything you have out and driving off into the great unknown with no real plan other than the one that appears that day! Rather, you can just drive a new way to work and if you get lost, don't panic, just trust you will find your way!
Eventually, you'll have your own new stories of adventure disasters to share with new friends and you'll both enjoy the new found courage, strength, and laughter that comes from them…which by the way is a great way to manage the stress of great change.
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