Sunday, May 17, 2015

When I did some hard shit

Despite popular belief, studying abroad in New Zealand has not been all rainbows and waterfalls.  It actually splashed some freezing as (appreciate my use of Kiwi slang) water in my face.  And I’m not talking about the splashes I’ve willfully made into painfully cold water bodies along the trails. 

A transformation of self was… considered, but not quite expected.  Would my time abroad help me figure out what I want to do with my life? Would I figure out the “next big step”?

Yea well, studying abroad only confirmed my confusion about how one tackles the world. 

I instead endured a tormenting, yet straightforward self-evaluation these last few months.

My flat mates and I stumbled upon the “36 Questions to Bring You Closer to Someone” developed by psychologists, and decided to stay up late one night and ask each other them.  One in particular stuck out to me…

The Question: If a crystal ball could tell you the truth about yourself, your life, the future or anything else, what would you want to know?

My answer: Am I a good person?

One first has to start out with an even more difficult challenge, what defines a decent human being?

I can’t answer that. I’ll never be able to answer that. I’m not even sure the damn crystal ball could answer that. 

The best approach one could possibly take to figuring that out is a long, excruciating, and 100% honest self-assessment.

Here’s the blatant facts…

1.  I am selfish.

I grew up an only child.  I take more than I give.  I started to realize that my freshman year of college when I had to share a room for the first time.  And while I’ve made a dramatic improvement to this weakness, I still have work to do. 

2.  I avoid confrontation

The world has every right to walk all over me because I’ve let it.  My flat mate graciously laid it out in blatant terms for me: “You’d rather let yourself bleed before watching someone else bleed.”

Sure, it’s nice to be considered that nice girl who couldn’t hurt a fly, blah blah blah.  But it’s a hell of a lot nicer to confront a situation in a classy, and let’s not forget, sassy, manner. 

There’s that cliché saying– “If you want respect you have to earn it.”  Well, I truly want to give people the benefit of the doubt.  And I’ve picked up this bad habit of making excuses for others’ ill-mannered actions. 

That’s a practice I’ve finally had the courage to toss in the trash. 

I do still wish to hold on to the hopeful view I have of the world and its inhabitants.  So turning the cliché around in a way more suitable for me - if you want my disrespect, you have to earn it.  

Coincidentally enough, I happened to come across someone plagiarizing this very blog.  Given this is an outlet for me that I put a significant amount of time and effort into, as well as take personal pride in, I was livid.  Three months ago, the unself-assessed Emily may not have even confronted the situation.  And if she had, she would have done it in a polite, I-still-want-to-be-friends-no-hard-feelings manner.  Lets just say I didn’t come remotely close to falling back on my previous (and utterly pathetic) means of “confrontation.”

3. Sharing feelings is an ocean of dark, uncharted waters for me.

Propose a pillow talk with gossip and boy talk? I would rather vomit profusely all over the pillow.

Super cheesy social media posts, or worse, crying in public? Not exactly my forte.

Some may not consider this reserved aspect of me a limitation, but it’s become self-detrimental.  Especially whilst attempting to adopt “womanhood”.

I’m not remarkably different from a 12-year old boy.  I enjoy playing in mud.  I wear gym clothes for about 99% of my life.  I fart in front of my disgusted friends and laugh about it.  I take pride in acquiring battle wounds from climbing trees, buildings, etc. and thoroughly enjoy picking the scabs off later.  I like seeing how far I can project a snot rocket.  And above all, I hate mushy-gushy-lovey-dovey anything.  Try to maturely approach me with the subject, and I will throw things and jump on furniture.  

Real life wake up call: I’m a 20 year-old soon-to-be Junior in college. 

And while I hope to never grow out of my child-like ambiance or lose my passion for adventure, it may be time to shed some of the mud-caked skin.  It may be time to toughen up and share..."feelings" and things that drives me crazy, no matter how much it scares me to do so. 

There are some personal barriers I’m ready to knock down.  And I’m proud to say that since coming to this country, I’ve recognized them, and have boarded the bulldozer to begin smashing my way through these self-constructed walls. 

On a better note, I’ve begun to recognize what I like about myself.  I also owe a huge thank you to my flat mates who helped bring these attributes to my attention. 

1. A love for loving life 

I tend to view the world through an idealistic, romantic lens.  I grew up in a privileged family.  I’ve had the gracious opportunity to attend college, travel, and experience the world.  And if I were to die tonight, I’d go satisfied with the beauty I have had the honor of seeing (don’t get me wrong, there is still plenty more I wish to see and discover).

But I’m also fully aware of the adversities and evils harbored within it.  To ignore this would be naïve, and painfully ignorant.  I’ve had the honor (yes, I call this an honor) of growing up and working in an economically deprived town, and seeing the not-so-shiny corners of life.  I’ve had the honor of watching the news at night, and learning of the lowest of lows happening oceans away from me.  Some people are truly crazy.  And some are just plain evil. 

It’s a fucked up place out there. 

But detract humanity from the picture, and the world is a majestically admirable place.

Knowing this, I strive to embrace the romantic, idealistic aspects of it that I’ve fallen in love with.  The geological beauties of Earth significantly surpass the manmade detriments placed upon it.  And unfortunately, there’s an incredible amount of humanity submerged beneath the detriments.  But I am privileged, and have had the fortune to embark experiences that provided me with this romantic lens of the world.  I try to live and share what I’ve seen and done (a huge reason for the start up of this blog) in respect for those who can’t.  

2. Self Awareness

No, it doesn’t feel good to call myself selfish.  Or utterly pathetic due to my inability to openly communicate with people.  It’s embarrassing to recognize just how immature I am.  It’s an uncomfortable feeling to assess everything that I dislike about myself.  And an equally terrifying thought, what the people I love might dislike about me.  

Don’t care what people think about you? Good for you. 

But for me, there are people I truly respect and love, and I genuinely care about what they think of me.  And after conducting a self-assessment, there are things I can improve upon that will help me respect myself and strengthen my relationships with my friends and family even more.    

My self-awareness is an attribute I’ve grown to simultaneously love and hate, and know in the long run will help me grow into the person I want to be.

3.  Go happy, go lucky, go with no idea of what will happen, but just go. 

I’ve had a couple of eye-opening trips here.  Hell, all of them have been eye-opening.  And ya know what? Some of them I never would have the honor of partaking in if I didn’t have a happy-go-lucky mindset. 

I already talked a little about the spontaneous decision I made in doing the Kepler track in "The Twin Paradox of Emily in New Zealand: Part 2".

When I did Milford track, which happens to be the most beautiful place I have been to EVER IN MY LIFE, I started off with a nasty sinus infection.  Nothing big, but I wasn’t keen on enduring 3 days in the midst of Fiorldand National Park (one of the wettest places in the entire world) with a plugged set of ears, sore throat, and nose running more than I had in months.  There was also the fact we were doing the track off-season, meaning the huts weren’t serviced, the weather was colder, and the days were shorter.  I actually tried selling my bus ticket the week before the trip. 

And I thank every universal force that no one showed interest in buying them.

We had three days of blue skies… that’s unheard of in Fiordland.  Looking out over Mackinnon Pass with its bizarre mountains, clouds rolling beneath me through the valleys carved between, surreal ponds exhaling their steamy breaths, and a Kea parrot circling above me, is a memory I’ll hold on to for life.





For the full album, click here

I saw the best views I may ever encounter.  I fully embraced just how lucky I am to be in this country and realized what a special period of my life this is.  And to think I might have spent that Saturday morning curled up in my bed with tea and a box of tissues. 

Back to my point…

I still have no idea what I want to do for the rest of my life.  I still set fire alarms off while cooking aka making toast. 

But, I know who I am.  Weirdly enough, most people don’t know who they are.  And weirder enough, an honest and brutal self-evaluation is one of the harder things one may ever endure.

It was a challenge I had not expected to endeavor, let alone one to take so seriously and sort of succeed at.  

I came to New Zealand for the landscapes and the lifestyle.   I had not pictured a critical self-assessment in the cards for me. 

But the world of cliché’ wasn’t joking when it said life’s full of surprises. 


Here I caught myself in the midst of one.

Keep Happy,
Em

Tuesday, May 5, 2015

It's okay to just chill.

Ironically, my last 3 weeks of hustlin’ bustlin’ excessively ambitious traveling led to one profound intellectual realization. 

It’s okay to just chill.

A quick recap of my Spring/Fall Break (it’s fall weather here but I’m accustomed to associating April with Spring so feel my struggle)... 

Week 1
Spent with my loving parents in and around Queenstown, Doubtful Sound, and Hanmer Springs. 

Mom driving on the left side of the road...




The car we rented

Doubtful Sound




Week 2
Two Felicias one tent…  To avoid widespread confusion, it’s time for me to create a universal definition for my use of the word Felicia via an Internet source.  So here…

Felicia (fuh-leesh-uh)
Noun, adjective, you name it
Derived from the vine “Bye Felicia”, this term may be used to reveal feelings of annoyance, to describe people, or to express…anything your creative mind desires.  Just say it, it’ll sound right.    
Ex/ “This cat just farted on me omg what a Felicia.”

Two Felicias one tent consisted of my flat mate and myself (two Felicias) venturing through the radiant rainforest and coastlines of Abel Tasman National Park (habiting one tent). 








Despite the fact Jena (flat mate) was sick and warded off most/all living creatures with her coughs and snots, we made some friends that led me to that profound intellectual realization I mentioned earlier. Also because Jena warded off most living creatures with her coughs and snots, I had a lot of alone time due to the elimination of the potential of most friend-making.  We’ll get to that. 

Week 3
RARATONGA (Cook Islands) with my study abroad program.  Lots of food, dogs, rain, etc.  









Overall, an amazing time with amazing people.  


Some other observations being…
1. Living the Island Life is harder than it looks... (photocreds to Eunice for these beauty shots)

Husking a coconut sort of. 
Helping plant things sort of.
2.  Floating in the middle of a lagoon is chill.  Also I finally learned how to float.
3. There’s a way to overcome being uncomfortably full by eating more. 
4. If you’ve never gone putt putting after a few beverages that’s a life mistake you need to fix.
5. A visit to the local elementary school confirmed kids don’t like me. But they liked the other kids at least.

6.  Swimming in waterfalls is better than swimming in most things.
7. Not having Internet for a week was more enjoyable than having Internet.
8. Snorkeling is highly underrated for its awesomeness. Check out the video I took below on my GoPro! (sorry for the obnoxious background music of water slapping my camera) 


9. When you’re overly over-tired you stumble upon some peculiar thoughts.
Ex/ I mentally rebuilt my elementary school playground during a lecture on the Island’s political history.
After a thorough analysis of my ever-so-philosophical thoughts I came across during those 3 weeks, somehow “It’s okay to just chill” became the one that dominated. 

The two nights I spent in the middle of a remote rainforest in Abel Tasman National Park led to interesting conversation with my flat mate.  She told me some cool things she knew about astronomy during our stargazing sessions.  One is the most confusing thing I will ever try to wrap my brain around ever (formally referred to as the String Theory)…

Our Universe is made up of several dimensions, theoretically ten of them, and we’re hardly even aware of four.  Don’t think about it too hard if you want to sleep tonight. 

Second is that there are theoretically TWO Universes, NOT JUST ONE.  The theory is that post Big Bang, one Universe (the one we take up negligent space in) is constantly expanding and time is moving forward, while there is another parallel Universe (the one we barely know the existence of) that is constantly decreasing in size and time is moving…. backwards.  Yea. 

Links to prove I’m not talking out of my butt:

My offering of this information is not as random as it seems.  It just so happened to be the initial inspiration for my “It’s okay to just chill” notion.  Given the ten dimensions and the two different Universes, the amount of space we take up as individuals is literally negligent.  We define our own success and happiness, OR I MEAN AT LEAST WE SHOULD, so what is the point of being concerned with what the other negligent amount of space is defining as success, happiness, you know, that sort of thing? I mean this in the best way possible when I say that at the end of the day, we’re all just negligent amounts of space.  At first, this sounds rather depressing, but if you think about the minimal impact of your space on the grandeur of space taken by all these dimensions and universes, its really quite liberating.  So do with yours what you will, and let everyone else do with theirs what they will. 

More inspiration hit for my… intellectual “chillin’” notion when I met a lovely French lady at the hostel we stayed at in Nelson.  We discovered we’d both been in New Zealand for about two months, and as I was talking to her about her travels, she mentioned something along the lines of, “So yea, still just the beginning.”  Maybe she noted the bewilderment in my eyes as she explained how she’d been given THE ENTIRE YEAR OFF OF WORK to just… travel.  I proceeded to ask her if this is a commonality where she’s from.  Turns out it’s a commonality in all of Europe and they think us Americans are the weird ones.  I also proceeded to meet a few other Europeans staying in the hostel doing the same exact thing as she.  The trend was that very few of them had a plan of action as to where they were going next, very few of them seemed to care that they had no plan of action, and absolutely none of them were concerned about the responsibilities they were leaving behind during their year-long holiday.  So yea, they basically screamed it’s okay to just chill.

The last contribution to my new philosophy came from my experience in Raratonga, and learning of Island time.  Island time is unlike normal people time in that its daytime when the sun is out and that its nighttime when the sun goes down and people are just doin’ their thing.  Simple as that.  Ironically, I experienced little of Island time as I was with my study abroad program that planned an over abundance of activities.  I was more or less a “distant admirer” of Island time and became rather envious of the Maori Islanders’ culture clock.

I apologize for my random, confusing approach to philosophy, but do me a favor and test the theory.  Consider all of the ideas that just chillin’ could evoke… you could find a way to make lettuce taste like pizza, discover a keen interest in the perplexities of astronomy, turn a name into an obnoxious use of a word (sorry Felicia), whatever satisfies your mind’s creative juices.  You’d never guess how much you miss out on inside your head when you’re so involved with what’s going on outside your head.


I hate (love) to repeat my use of Ferris Bueller’s intellect, but “Life moves pretty fast.  If you don’t slow down and look around once in a while, you could miss it.” Peace.

Keep Happy,
Em