“Are you having fun?” my uncle asked. It was a very popular question amongst my friends and family when I flew home for Christmas after two months on the road. I struggled to answer it because I was up to my eyeballs with stress from tripling my daily workout, from reinventing all of my daily routines through trial and error, and from an ambitious foray into public speaking. Naps were always my superpower and I hadn’t had a proper siesta since I set out.
It was the good kind of stress, though. I was doing what I had set out to do, facing the challenges and working through them. Each success — however painful — gave me a jolt of confidence that I could pull off this audacious mission.
A year later, my confidence is unshakeable. Cycling around the world seems almost trivial, like I could tack it onto the end of this trip as a little bonus.
But oh-my-god the deadlines! My life has never been this rigidly scheduled. Between the sheer size of Texas, meeting Lin, losing all of my possessions, and wanting to learn how to write, every ounce of energy was spoken for. Plus my back and hip have been angry, taking away my ability to fix problems with an extra long day or two. Several months of speaking engagements all hinged on my ability to reach my destination today… and tomorrow… and the next day. A calendar-shaped house of cards.
This is the bad kind of stress, trying to do much at once and living every moment in that anxiety. I wasn’t having fun
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“Are you having fun?” my uncle asked. It was a very popular question amongst my friends and family when I flew home for Christmas after two months on the road. I struggled to answer it because I was up to my eyeballs with stress from tripling my daily workout, from reinventing all of my daily routines through trial and error, and from an ambitious foray into public speaking. Naps were always my superpower and I hadn’t had a proper siesta since I set out.
It was the good kind of stress, though. I was doing what I had set out to do, facing the challenges and working through them. Each success — however painful — gave me a jolt of confidence that I could pull off this audacious mission.
A year later, my confidence is unshakeable. Cycling around the world seems almost trivial, like I could tack it onto the end of this trip as a little bonus.
But oh-my-god the deadlines! My life has never been this rigidly scheduled. Between the sheer size of Texas, meeting Lin, losing all of my possessions, and wanting to learn how to write, every ounce of energy was spoken for. Plus my back and hip have been angry, taking away my ability to fix problems with an extra long day or two. Several months of speaking engagements all hinged on my ability to reach my destination today… and tomorrow… and the next day. A calendar-shaped house of cards.
This is the bad kind of stress, trying to do much at once and living every moment in that anxiety. I wasn’t having fun