Growing up in Montana, I was constantly surrounded by dog lovers.  Dogs were family. Trusted friends, protectors, furry children and loved companions.

I, however, didn’t grow up with a dog in my life. Due to an unfortunate paper route as a child, my father wasn’t too keen on canines, and acquiesced by allowing cats (outdoor only) instead. I loved the cats I had growing up, but always sensed I was missing out on some magical relationship with a dog – I wanted to experience the “unconditional” love dog lovers so often highlight as the best trait of their furry friends.

Once I was on my own, I considered adopting a dog thousands of times. But city life was challenging enough, and honestly I probably wasn’t ready for the commitment. So life continued dog free, leaving me to often wonder if that pure, honest love really existed.

During this time, I dated, fell in love and made a life with someone. The relationship ended after eight years and I started to believe unconditional love was impossible.

I carried this belief with me as I started to date again.  Nothing ever lasted more than a few dates, and I often found myself disappointed with the whole game.  It must be me.  

I’m not cut out for love.

After my first “break up” in my new single life, I sequestered myself in the bedroom for the day, allowing myself to shiver and cry in private. Emptiness filled the room, and once again I considered the possibility that it was me that had the issue.  I was broken. A deluge of tears let loose, soaking my pillow.

Alone, hurt and incredibly sad, I searched for the only living comfort I had left – my cat.  After calling out to him several times to no avail, I gave up and pulled the covers over my head.  It seemed like hours before he finally sauntered into the bedroom, quietly hopping up on the bed to see what the hell the racket was all about (he was napping, after all).

Barely able to see through my tear-swollen eyes, I inched a hand out from underneath my cave of blankets to pet him.  Normally a sweet and loving kitty, he did have the unfortunate tendency to occasionally bite the shit out of me for no apparent reason. I hoped he sensed my suffering, and convinced myself he was there for moral support.  That made me feel better.

Right up until the moment his claws embedded in my arm, his sharp little teeth clamped tightly around my wrist.

Unconditional love my ass.

That day I started researching foster dog programs, and a week later found myself taking home a beautiful brindle pit-mix with big eyes and a dash of salt and pepper fur around his face.  He was around eight years old, and narrowly escaped euthanasia only weeks before.  

I think we knew we were both a little damaged.

Our first few weeks together were uneventful.  I enjoyed having him around, and he started to settle in with me as well.  We went for walks, played fetch and enjoyed umpteen belly rubs.  But I didn’t feel that magical love I was expecting, and I don’t think he did either. Again, I suspected I was the heart of the issue.  I was unlovable.  If a dog didn’t love me, who could?

Then it happened. Like magic, just as I’d fantasized in my youth.  

I came home from work, unraveling after a horrible day in the office, a failed attempt to patch things up with a guy I’d been dating and looking up from the bottom of one of the worst major depressive episodes of my life.  I crumpled into a shaking, crying mess of hair and tears and on the kitchen floor.

I was defeated.  Beaten, bruised and hopeless.

I heard the pad of paws on the floor and looked up to see the dog galloping toward me from the back yard, his dinner barely touched. His large, brown eyes were wide, his head cocked slightly to the left as if to ask “Are you o.k.?”

He was at my side in an instant, gently nuzzling my face with a look of deep concern and empathy in his eyes.  I reached out and wrapped my arms around his muscular neck and shoulders.  He rested his chin on my shoulder and let me cry.

When I couldn’t cry anymore, he followed me to my room and kept watch by my side the rest of the evening, occasionally stretching his head over the bed to give me a kiss – to let me know he was there.

I finally slept, and when I woke he hadn’t moved.  He looked up expectantly, and I smiled back at him.  His tail began to wag excitedly – he knew I was feeling better.  

Still exhausted and drained from the previous night, I wasn’t up for much, but wanted to express my appreciation for his vigil with a special breakfast. I stepped outside to grab his bowl only to find it still full, his water untouched. This abandoned dog, with every reason in the world to look out for his own survival, ignored his own needs – for what? For me?  

I was overcome with the most amazing and humbling sensation. Was this unconditional love?

Suddenly the air was warm and my heart swelled in my chest. I sat down next to his bowl, coaxing him over to eat.

He ignored the bowl, and looked up at me with loving eyes as he kissed away the tears on my face.

All You Need Contributor: Jennifer Winter

Jennifer Winter is a writer, wanderer, and wine lover living in Oakland, California (but always plotting travels abroad). She translates her 14 years of corporate combat experience to help young women navigate their careers through her column for The Daily Muse, and shares her own experiences tackling her fears on her blog FearLess Jenn. You can find her on Twitter @fearless_jenn.

Song: This Must Be The Place by Talking Heads

My beloved Little One,

I know that life has felt terribly unfair, living with me—the overachiever—plus your older brother who is bright enough to be a super nova in the Milky Way and our conservative parents whose merest touch feels like a chokehold to you.

I know that your heart told you passionately that you had to leave home, and you did. And even though we were all broken and frightened and out of our minds because we’d discovered your secrets and your hidden plans…it worked out for the best. We found better paths of love with our words when you came back. That trail of better words was blazed with dull machetes, but in the end I’m proud of the scars.

But Little One, that was just a chapter. I see it now. Your pain and your life has many levels and though I’m proud of how far you and I have come, it still breaks me to see these new scars, the ones filled with anger and anxiety–your efforts to cut away and let free the agony boiling in your blood. Those are scars I’m not proud of, red, wet mouths opening on your arms, red cuts that scream for help, but only turn inward to bite you more deeply. And even though these real-life scars of yours are healing now and the razors are safely stowed away, I still feel my pain for you driving deeper inside me. But I wouldn’t have it any other way.

Why am I so obsessed with the state of your soul? Should I just step away and let you live your life without any comment or interference from me? It’s only been a few years since we lived in the same house, and it’s already as if fossils are already forming in the eons.

But I can’t get away from this: Ever since you were very small, I’ve loved you as the chink in my armor, my weak spot, my special poison/antidote (depending on the situation), the person for whom I fear so many of my convictions would be thrown to the wind if I thought it would take you out of harm’s way.

I think I love you too much. Maybe that’s not possible, but sometimes I wonder morbidly if that’s what I struggle with, if that’s what’s torturing me. I love you as I loved you when you were born, without holding anything back, and now you’re separating, tearing out of the cocoon that I erroneously built for you. One of your wings is bleeding, but you don’t want the ointment I’m offering for it because you’re afraid it will tint your wings like mine and you want to be your own color. I admire that about you. It also makes me cry.

You are a woman and you know how to roar. I am the sister who has learned how to cry, to love, to fight, to apologize, and to grow up with you in ways that I’ve never expected.

I write this to you because it is blooming up from my heart like a hot fountain, completely unable to stay down, falling into my mouth and clenching my jaw till it aches, sifting into my prayers until all I can say is God help her. Help me. Take care of her. I can’t do it by myself.

I love you. I always will love you. Even when I verbally stab you in the back and even when you’re embarrassed by me.

I love you when you turn away from me and ignore what I say, and I love you when you kiss me on the cheek and remind me that you can forgive and love again, too. In times of love and war, I will love you till the day I die.

I thought you should know.

And don’t give up. Don’t ever give up. No matter the pain, the disillusionment, the heartless breakups with the guy who used or abused or just plain underestimated your incredible soul.

Don’t give in to rage when Mom and Dad can’t hear what you’re saying and all they seem to do is stuff you into a box of expectations. Don’t give up when school is yanking your will to live right out from under you. Don’t give up when rejections tell you you’re not worth the risk.

Because it’s not true.

I promise. I’ve seen you live. I’ve watched you grow. God knit you in Mom’s womb, but he didn’t give you a how-to manual because there isn’t one. You have to live the manual.

So that’s what I needed to say. And one more time: I love you.

Your sister

All You Need Contributor: Elise Stephens

Elise Stephens received the Eugene Van Buren Prize for Fiction from the University of Washington in 2007. When she isn’t writing, she enjoys seeing live theater, swing dancing, eating tiramisu, singing, and painting. She lives in Seattle with her husband James. Her novel Moonlight and Oranges was a quarter-finalist for the 2011 Amazon Breakthrough Novel Award. Visit her blog about relationships, life, and inspiration here: www.elisestephens.com and follow her on Twitter @elisestephens and Facebook http://www.facebook.com/AuthorEliseStephens

Song: Dance Sister Dance by Santana

The most selfish organ is the heart.

When a kidney stops working, you’ve still got one left that can survive on its own. But when the heart stops working, all the other organs shut down. Zip. Zilch. You’re dead, baby.

Being heart-centered means following your passions and being “selfish” to the rest of the world. But even in the literal sense, being selfish or indulgent is necessary to function! We’ve got to care for ourselves first, do what makes us happy. Find our bliss.

Are You Really Living?

Being hedonistic sometimes gets a bad rep, but the journey towards happiness and self-love is a journey, ultimately, from within. By giving ourselves the gift of love, we can share and emanate our outpouring of love to others. Cultivate our compassion. The Buddha didn’t become the Buddha until he left his luxurious comforts of being a prince and sought out the personal solo journey of self-discovery and asceticism. Only then was he able to share it to others and speak his wisdom, through love.

In the book The Alchemist, by Paolo Coelho, the protagonist goes on a soul journey. The idea of spiritual pilgrimage, of finding oneself, has been around for centuries. It was the tug of the road for the beatniks. And every generation, another one bites the dust.

Always think with your heart, because it’s more powerful than the mind.

Do what you love.

Love what you do.

Getting To Know My Inner “Humanitarian Chick”

It took me one failed, long term relationship that lasted the first half of my twenties, and one “quarterlife crisis” to figure out that I needed to love myself. I needed to find my passions again. Unlock that girl that loved art and painting and lived creativity. Get to know my inner “humanitarian chick”.

And so, I learned to follow my intuitions again, not knowing where it would take me or what was around the bend. I learned not to listen to anyone who told me otherwise, who had that condescending veil of silence that I could read between the lines. I learned to think with my heart.

It took me to blogging, where I wrote poetry and creative writing I didn’t know I could write. It took me to India to teach slum school kids. It took me to the Philippines where I joined meditation retreats and went on a 660 km walking pilgrimage of my own. It took me on a journey towards location independence. It took me back to romantic love.

I told myself I would take two years to be single to find what makes my heart beat again. Like clockwork, it was two years exactly, on October 18th, 2010, that my walking partner and I were seduced by the jungle; the canopy of trees, the magic of tropical rain and Avatar-esque glow in the dark foliage beneath our feet, succumbing to a magical rendezvous underneath our makeshift shelter of yoga mat + blanket strewn across tree branches.

Self Love Comes First

It always does. I knew I couldn’t love another until I learned to love myself and live my passions. Prior to my walk, I declared I would change my blog from The “Solitary” Panda to Purple Panda, telling my soon-to-be love that it was time to start a different intention. The intention to live a life that was extraordinary, instead of solitary.

I’m not your typical girl. I hate dating and refuse to “play the game”. It may sound counter-intuitive to most “single and looking”, but the most intuitive thing I ever did for myself was to forge my own path, solo. It was my pro-active way to finding romantic love again. Because love happens when you least expect it. And I learned how to let it flow.

Instead of dating and focusing externally on which guy would suit me best, I gave it all up. I looked inwards for the answers and made my own alchemy. I knew love would come when I was ready. And like an intuitive calling out her next life journey, I set the intention that I was ready to let romantic love in, ready to meet my “spiritual partner”, and ready to live life Purple; that extraordinary, spiritual and creatively unique path to entrepreneurship that I envisioned would help me stand out from the rest.

Follow Your Bliss

Although my walking pilgrimage is over, it’s never really over. It’s everything that life represents. All the trials and tribulations, simple gratitudes, and uncomfortable struggles that make life worth it. Love the process. Follow your bliss. Find True Love, in the greatest sense of the word. The all-encompassing, unconditional light from which romantic love stems.

And love every minute of it!

All You Need Contributor: Janet Brent

Janet is a graphic/web design intuitive who works with indies in the creative, eco-conscious and holistic arts. Her passion for building her business, working with other passionate people, and making positive change is only the beginning of more extraordinary things to come. Currently residing in Manila, Philippines, her path to freedom and location independence is well on its way towards Asia and beyond. You can find her marching to her own beat at Purple Panda or tweeting up a storm @janetbrent

Song: Tonight, Tonight by The Smashing Pumpkins

photo credit: Helga Weber via photopin cc

I would always know I was loved.

I didn’t read through all the entries until I got here. They had many of the same sentiments like “We’ll miss you”, “Have fun”, “Take care”. What else do you write in a journal for someone packing up their life to move to the other side of the planet?

There was another common theme that ran through so many of the comments as well, one that I’ve heard a lot recently as I’ve started finding my voice again and meeting new people.

My friend Elsa summed it up best when she wrote to me:

But more than that – I hope you’re loving life because that is what is beautiful about you. You have an unabashed and intense love for this life

You know those exercises when you are supposed to think of what you hope or wish people would say about you at your funeral? This, above any fame or fortune or connection or accomplishment, is what I would want people to think of and remember about me.

Because you know what?

Life Is Beautiful

Just take a few minutes to look around.

A solid few minutes. Really observe what is around you. In this very moment. In this very place. What do you see? What do you hear? What do you smell?

How does it all make you feel?

If the answer is something that does not bring at least the slightest glimmer of a smile, then you are doing life wrong.

I feel like I’m living that Louis CK video every day, not just while I’m flying. “Everybody [on every plane] should just constantly be going “OH MY GOD! WOW!”

If you were to take a peek inside my brain, on most days this clip plays at least five times.

How can it not?!

Yet, it can be so easy to push the smallest pieces of awe and wonder aside, to focus on the things that consume our being for all the wrong reasons.

Life Can Get Messy

Yes, there are those moments and days and weeks and years that feel so damn un-pretty. That leave us hurt and broken, a weight on our shoulders and a heaviness in our hearts.

Our spirits grow dark, we lose the ability to shine and sparkle for the world. Desperately we claw and scrape, trying to find the light again.

It does not come the first night. Nor the morning after. It can feel like it is consuming us. Then one day, based on no particular change or specific moment, it isn’t so dark any more. The light begins to peek through the cracks and hope becomes something you can touch again.

That is part of the beauty of life. The ebb and flow, the highs and lows, the beauty and the scars. They all weave together into this magnificent fabric that we can wrap ourselves in at any time to feel enveloped and loved.

I love Love. And I love Life.

And that is why, for the month of February I’m once again opening up my blog to a new contributor every day for the third installment of the All You Need Is Love Series. 28 people will write, photograph, and draw their own experiences and concepts of all things love.

They will challenge you, comfort you, make you laugh and make you cry.

I wouldn’t have it any other way. Enjoy!

Song: Over The Rainbow/What A Wonderful World by Israel “Iz” Kamakawiwo’ole

From the moment my parents put a copy of The Color Kittens in my little 2 year old hands (yes, I started reading by myself when I was 2 years old) I could be found daily curled up with a book.

Fast-forward to elementary school when I informed my parents I no longer wanted to read “baby books” and they started purchasing me Great Illustrated Classic books from KB Toys and for a bit from the local supermarket. These were chapter books. CHAPTER BOOKS! My excitement was hardly containable.

My first was 20,000 Leagues Under The Sea (I was probably 7 or 8 ) and I was enthralled. Giant squids and Captain Nemo and porthole windows and adventure…the stories enveloped me into a world of further imagination. They nurtured a sense of wonder and curiosity in my tiny impressionable mind.

I was convinced that even if the stories were fiction, the possibilities of life and the world were endless.

When we moved to a new town in Middle School, my parents marched in to my 8th grade teacher’s classroom during the second week, infuriated because I had already read every book on my class syllabus. Is there anything more embarrassing as a 13 year old? Secretly I was thrilled. She created a special reading plan just for me that took me away to Watership Down, which I consumed like a vulture and promptly took to sobbing because the rabbits died and/or chewed off their feet in traps. (This also became the period of my life where I was a vegetarian)

In high school, my love affair turned passionate as I began expanding my vocabulary and understanding of language by taking four years of Latin. My teacher, Magister Lawrenson, to this day is easily one of the most fascinating and brilliant people I have ever met. His classes were hard but I loved the challenge. Classical language study was like cocaine to me.

As I learned the origin of words and how alluringly poetic language could be, I fell deeper and deeper in love with it. I began keeping a notebook with me at all times, and I would write down words I didn’t know or that I found interesting. At night I would sit down with my Webster’s Dictionary and diligently research the etymology (word history and origins) and definition. A friend recently told me that he did that as well…because his English teacher made them do it for an assignment.

I did it for love.

Language was like a song. A lilting melody in every sentence I read. Words are beautiful.

In college, after abandoning my hopes of musical stardom and success, I settled in to a brief dalliance in a philosophy major and eventually a dual major in Classical Studies (concentration in Latin) and English/Creative Writing. Suddenly all those years I had spent consumed with learning and loving language were manifesting into a potential career and future lifestyle. I was in control of the words now. Like a gentle shift in an afternoon tryst, my lover was ready for whatever I wanted to do. Comical tales of romance, deeply themed stories of strife, marathon conversations about theories and rhetoric, and some awful poetry about cabbage.

After college, when I was forced in to the real world of cubicles and conformity and competition, my love affair began to wane. After 22 years the honeymoon seemed to be over. I felt like I had lost a small piece of myself. Often when I’d engage my vocabulary, I was met with teasing and bullying. One colleague used to comment to me frequently “There you go with your big $5 words. Trying to sound smarter than the rest of us.”

It never occurred to me in all my word nerdiness that I would somehow use language as a weapon of intelligence.

Words were not missiles to be launched vindictively. There are so many that are never used, but perfectly convey what you want to say. Words were everything that I craved in my own romantic relationships. Exciting and compelling and engaging and mystical and rich with history and meaning and context. Let’s face it, language is one of the sexiest things out there.

I didn’t know that I didn’t need to be like everyone else and I didn’t want people to hate me. So I left my lover alone in a quiet room, and shut the door. Promising to be back, but never sure that I’d ever walk in to that room again. In part, I wanted to leave it a pristine memory of a time that had been. As time passed, my shame grew. I distracted myself, avoiding the room in the tower that pulled my very essence from my chest.

Working on a story for Forbes (about Ebeneezer Scrooge and social media oddly enough) my lover arrived unexpectedly at my bedside. Gently shaking me from my slumber and swiftly sliding into the sheets beside me. Forgiving me without question for my disappearance. Our reunion was hesitant and cautious, like the rekindling of an affair with a prior partner. Yet somehow comfortable and magical, reminding me of the happiness I once had basking in language’s glow.

Anyone can develop a love affair with language and words.

You don’t have to start as a toddler reading about Brush and Hush to fall madly in love. You can begin your relationship at any time.

• Read A Dictionary - Pull out (or up) a dictionary and carefully read the definition (all the definitions) then all the “junk” after the definition. What did the word first mean? How is it grammatically used? What is the origin?
• Appreciate Etymology – You don’t have to study classical languages for 7 years to appreciate etymology. Words like awesome used to mean something. Awe comes from the Greek word áchos which means pain. Something is awesome when it has such an effect on you it feels painful.
• Do Crossword Puzzles - The one in the back of the TV Guide doesn’t count. Do the New York Times Crossword Puzzle. The first  time you do you will probably know less than a quarter of the answers. I barely finish half myself.
• Read Fiction - I know, this one just pissed off a lot of you. I’m not sorry. Good fiction writing is laced with irresistible language. If you can’t trudge through an entire novel at least take to short stories. Pick up a good anthology. You won’t want to put it down.

Fall in love with language today.

Give in to the dark side.

Your life will be richer because of this love affair.

I promise.

It is going to be motorcycles (motorbikes as they are mostly called round these parts).

Traffic related accidents are, in fact, the most common cause of injury and death for American travelers in foreign countries. Now, I am normally not a coordinated person. I’m covered with bruises most of the time from running in to walls/doors/other people. This bodes badly for me.

There is a story of my mother bringing me to the doctor for a routine kid thing and him being concerned that I was covered in bruises (thank you for the concern Doc!). As he was asking my Mom about her parenting skills and stress-levels I began running around his office like the curious and precocious child I was (am). Halfway through the interrogation I apparently took a head-long run at his roll-top desk and tried to slide underneath it. I didn’t quite make it and essentially bounced myself hard onto my back on the floor of his office. Waiting for the hysterical screams to emerge, instead he saw me jump back up, shake off a bit, and then start running around again.

He immediately quit questioning my mother.

In Bali, and apparently most of Asia, people drive like crazy people. There are not really any traffic rules, other than drive on the opposite side of the road from the US (driver’s seats in cars are on the right, which doesn’t really help you with sides of the road when you are on a motorbike), so it is like every human for themselves. I’ve experienced this. Crossing the street is like live-action Frogger.

Needless to say, since I haven’t been on a bike (motorized or pedal) for years, I’ve been a bit hesitant to give it a go. This is, of course, silly, and I will most likely NOT get dead from a motorbike accident. I’ll just get some killer road rash and a bit banged up.

Guys digs scars like chicks, right?

In the meantime, I have had my kind housemates benevolence and pity to help get around Seminyak and Kuta. This has caused two profound insights for me.

• I need to do way more planks, boats and core strengthening exercises because riding on the back of a motorbike going 30 KPH is all core, baby!
• I am totally at the mercy of everyone around me and barely in control of anything

The second insight came as I donned Dan’s helmet to head out and meet friends for dinner in Kuta. “Whatever happens, don’t react to anything that you see coming. If you think we are gonna hit the truck coming at us and jump or shift then we will go down” was the first and best piece of motorbike passenger safety I’ve gotten so far.

The thing with riding on the back of bikes with boys (and girls though I have no point of reference for that as of yet) is that anything you do affects both people on the motorbike. Except you don’t have any control of the bike, so if you do something motivated by your fear instinct, then you could force the bike onto the ground in a spin out. How is the driver supposed to be able to account for the things that you do when you are on the back ?

I do not do well with not having control over my situations.

I’m learning quickly to let go of it though. It is the only way to keep everyone safe.

This involves a serious level of trust in people I met just two weeks ago. I’ve gone flying over potholes, nudged through traffic on the highway, stared at an oncoming truck grill, and with all of it barely blinked an eye.

If you are a smart person then you make sure that you don’t get on anyone’s bike that you wouldn’t trust your life with. Honestly, that is exactly what you are doing when you climb on and grasp onto those handles.

Again, not a situation I’ve done well with in the past.

It’s funny the things you realize when you are forced to learn the lessons. Very quickly. In a life or limb sort of way.

photo credit: 27147 via photopin cc

When I left Detroit, Michigan in the US it was the afternoon of Monday, January 9th 2012. January 9th 2012, as observed by 99.99% of humanity was a normal day, just like any other day. There is nothing out-of-the-ordinary about January 9th, or January 10th for that matter. Social constructs on the rising and setting of the sun and Earth’s revolution that help us delineate our time into more manageable and understandable bite-sized pieces.

I boarded my plane and settled in to my Economy Class seat on a Delta 767 bound for Narita International Airport in Tokyo, Japan. Curling up with my Kindle, Spotify and noise cancelling ear buds I prepared for my 13+ hour flight across oceans and continents.

Happily devouring a few books, some pretty tasty in flight meals, and eventually donning my sleep mask and iPod Sleep Machine app to sleep for a few hours.

Note : If you have an iPhone or iPod go download the Sleep Machine app right now. A combination of ambient and white noises and complete with a timer and gentle alarm sound to wake you up, paired with noise cancelling ear buds it is my MUST HAVE for disruptive sleep spaces. Try out the free Lite version to see what I mean and then spring for the $1.99 app.

When I woke up and stretched in my seat, I glanced around and realized I had missed Delta’s in-flight breakfast. I glanced at my watch to see what time it was and was monumentally confused. Perhaps maybe a little groggy after my too-restful airplane nap of about 6 hours.

My watch said it was 2:30 PM on Tuesday, January 10th. But the flight crew was serving breakfast?

Then I remembered. I had set all my time pieces to Tokyo time when I boarded the plane so that I would I would acclimate to the new zone shift faster. A pretty standard pro-travel tip (though a good one to use nonetheless).

I was then hit with a pang of a little sadness.

That meant that I had lost 10 hours from my life.

The International Date Line, which runs (kind of) along the 180 Latitude line in the middle of the Pacific Ocean separates midnight from midnight, and January 9th from January 10th in my case. Between reading Price and Prejudice (for the 9 zillionth time) and settling in for my nap, an ominous cloud swept through our plane as it swiftly flew through much less devious white puffy clouds bound for the West.

Except now it was bound for the East.

The ominous cloud swept through and sucked 10 hours from each of our helpless bodies, strapped in to seat belts and squished into a cargo space 30,000 feet in the sky. It was as if I had stumbled in to some 1960′s science fiction movie about the horrors of flight in the future or at least a very twisted episode of The Twilight Zone.

People keep telling me “Oh don’t worry, you’ll get those 10 hours when you fly back home.”

Except the thing is you don’t get time back.

Once you have lost time, it is gone. It’s like your virginity. You don’t just get that back by moving to a new zip code.

Time is a concept, a measurement that we impose with a stated definition and an arbitrary metric based on our observations about things like stars and moons.

Essentially, someone could make up an entirely new time metric based on a box of Lucky Charms marshmallows if they really wanted.

Even knowing this, the pang still lingered in my mind.

I wondered where I was exactly and what I was doing when the ominous cloud of Lost Time hit me. Was I reading? Was I writing in my new grid-lined notebook? Was I eating a delicious but completely not-good-for-you Oreo cookie brownie? Was I sleeping? Was I playing Angry Birds?

It is so easy to lose time. To fall down the rabbit hole of Reddit or zone out watching a television program you barely care about. My first week here I lost a ridiculous amount of time sleeping practically 15 hours every day (split up into a few naps and some willed unconsciousness while battling through a stomach bug).

I’ve only been swimming in our gorgeous pool once. I’m just now going exploring beyond the 2 streets I’m already intimately acquainted with. I’ve barely finished a book or gotten any “for fun” writing done. I haven’t even attempted to crack the cloud files for my upcoming projects.

Taking it easy and finding time to goof off or relax are vital in our lives. That is one of the few universal truths in life. (Yes, I’ll say it, there are a few universal truths) I cannot, in the history of my existence, think of any one person who does not take at least five minutes a day to not be doing anything “productive”.

That being said, lost time can over-take us, with its ominous cloud nature. Before we know it, we are caught in a fog wondering why we are mindlessly munching on apple-smoked sausage links and sipping Tropicana at 2:30 in the afternoon.

All we can do at that point, once we have lost time, is take a deep breath and set forth to be more careful and intentional with our time.  We’ll slip up occasionally. This usually manifests itself as a browser opened to Facebook or Twitter. But time is something to be cherished, we only get so much of it.

My time was taken from me. Lost somewhere over the Pacific Ocean.

Where did you lose yours?

The thing, that I continue trying to impart but apparently fail miserably at, is that I am no different than anyone reading this blog right now thinking “I wish.”

I have been there. Reading the blog posts of globe-trotting million-dollar content production personal development life coaches and professional authors, drifting off into a day-dreaming state of imagination and longing.

Then, with a heavy heart and heaving sigh I’ve clicked the “X” in the upper-right hand corner of the browser to return to whatever task or mundane assignment I had to work on.

People like me don’t do things like that.

Those people were extraordinary. In the grandest sense of the word. They lived extraordinary lives in exotic locations (or just anywhere that they wanted). They created extraordinary companies and products. They wrote extraordinarily beautiful pieces of motivation and prose that made my hack conversation pieces seem like a 3rd grader’s composition homework.

They are extraordinary people. I am, in general (and especially in 2011), a hot mess.

Extraordinary people have extraordinary stories. Hot messes barely make it out of bed in the morning.

Everyone has a back story

Notably, some are exciting and thrilling, the stuff of an action-adventure blockbuster with stolen cars and burning houses.

Others glisten with the sparkling awe of superstar career trajectories and plush lifetime savings accounts.

Some may try to pass themselves off as a hot mess, but in reality they have those Little Tramp qualities that make them the scrappy underdogs that you can’t help but route for.

Others explore the world and travel to lands of adventure and wonder, all by the time they are 18 years old.

They have lives that lend themselves to an amazing story line. They have lives that were meant to be extraordinary.

What are we supposed to do, however, if we are “cursed” to have a very average back story. To be ordinary people, in love with extraordinary lives?

You Don’t Have To Be Extraordinary To Do Out-Of-The-Ordinary Things

I’m not going to lie to you. It helps.

Being extraordinary compels people to follow your story. To be engaged and route for your character. Will you overcome foes? Will you reach your dreams?

I am an extreme case-study in the average:

• I was raised by two parents who are still married after 35+ years
• I have one sibling (younger)
• I graduated high school and went to a state university
• I had never lived anywhere outside of the state I was born in
• I worked at an office job for nearly ten years
• I had never traveled outside the United States (I didn’t even own a passport)
• I lived modestly but I wasn’t throwing major rolls of cash in the bank
• I was sweet, kind, friendly, and dare I say nice.
• I have a kind of naive sense of wonderment and awe at the world around me

If my back story were the setting for a novel or movie, I’d be the human equivalent of Victorian literature in which they take 20 pages to describe the ominous fog and waving tall grass of the moors (see, George Eliot, I just whipped that out in less than 20 words!). A very bland bunching of average tales and average adventure.

I fell into the mindset, as so often happens when you are desperately searching for anyone or anything to give your life meaning rather than discovering it for yourself, that I needed to be one of those people to live those lives.

That I couldn’t even begin to write my own amazing story until I had enough of an introduction to get started.

No one would want to hear about or read about or talk about or care about some small-town girl from Maine who was making ripples not waves.

The common myth is that you need to be extraordinary to do extraordinary things.

That isn’t the case.

You have to do out-of-the-ordinary things to be extraordinary

You can still make shit happen. You have the power to be the author of your own story. To be the person sitting behind the laptop/typewriter/Moleskine feverishly creating the twists and turns of a life you choose to live.

This isn’t a chicken-and-the-egg situation here, kids. Extraordinary people may SEEM extraordinary, but most all of them still have to put on their pants one leg at a time (except for bona fide actual ninjas, and you just shouldn’t mess with those guys anyways!)

They had to DO extraordinary things to make themselves extraordinary. It wasn’t bestowed on them. The opportunity to do extraordinary things didn’t come because they were extraordinary.

It came because they did something.

If you had asked ANYONE on October 10th,2011 if they thought I would pack up my entire life and move to the other side of the planet to live with a bunch of people I don’t know while working on their start-up business the answer would have been a resounding guffawing deep-belly laugh.

People like me don’t do things like that.

And that right there is the point. That’s the difference.

Extraordinary people see the things that people like them don’t do, and then they set out to do them anyways.

The good news is you can get started today, this very moment, this VERY SECOND. Even if you are ordinary.

Sitting there dreaming and planning is not doing you any good.

It isn’t doing the world any good. We are capable of so many wonderful things as a human race. You don’t need to get your first passport and jump on a plane to the other side of the planet. But you do need to do something that shakes up a life you are unhappy with.

You don’t have to be extraordinary to do out-of-the-ordinary things.

But you are going to have to do out-of-the-ordinary things if you want to be extraordinary.

photo credit: LadyGuinevere! via photopin cc
 

When I took the TMBA gig and planned out my first travel adventure destination to be Bali, I finally got around (at the age of 31) to getting a passport. I hadn’t travelled internationally, except by car to Canada, and honestly a Mainer in Canada is like a New Jerseyian (Jerseyite?) in New York in terms of logistics.

Fortunately I’ve done a fair amount of domestic travel and flights (though my first of those was not until I was 25) so I’m not totally lost in the mechanics of travel.

International travel, that’s a whole different story.

Yet, somehow it isn’t.

While I soared through the air with the greatest of ease, I tried to jot down in my handy dandy travel notebook a few impressions and observations of my first international travel experience.

I step out of my shell in unfamiliar situations – Put me in a room where I have a bunch of acquaintances and I will find my closest friends and take up residence at the nearest corner booth. Put me in a security checkpoint line and I will find myself explaining to someone how to connect through Narita International like I do this weekly. I think that this will make for amazing stories of people I meet along the way and possibly make me a likely mark for drug mulery.

Being nice gets you places in every place – I committed the ultimate rookie travel mistake. It wasn’t even a rookie INTERNATIONAL travel mistake. It was a general rookie travel mistake.

Chatting up my new friend in line in security I threw my laptop in one bin and my track jacket, silver watch, iPod/Kindle pack, and clear plastic liquids bag in another. After tossing my bags on the conveyor, verifying my passport and boarding info and stepping through the detector an angry agent shouted something in Japanese at the woman behind the belt. “Is this your bag” she asked. This is the last thing you want to be asked in a security checkpoint.

Long story short (but not nearly as exciting (if you want the exciting but longer accounts of stories like this, make sure to sign-up for my Writing on the Webb inbox tales)) there was an issue with a water bottle. Chatting up the agent, being patient and kind, and admitting I made an idiot mistake cleared me through security without further incident.

On that note…

Don’t be an idiot – Sure, coming straight off a plane through the jet-plank-hallway thing to security should pretty clearly imply I haven’t had the opportunity to do anything devious. But rules are rules, even if they are dumb rules. Travel to places that they can deport (or extradite or whatever the heck it is) your ass, trying to adhere to their customs and guidelines tends to yield the least pain and suffering for all parties.

Sure, it took me nearly 45 minutes to stumble through immigration and customs in Singapore. But at least I didn’t get the “Sir, you are going to have to come with us” that the screaming yelling Canadian guy got (uh oh, am I gonna have to rethink my “I’m a Canadian, don’t be feisty with me” confrontation game plan?!)

Flying overhead at 30K feet, the world is pretty much all the same – Sure, there are some structural and aesthetic differences. Off the Northern West Coast the Pacific Ocean is a huge sheet of ice, in Tokyo there are fire rigs burning off something in the ports, flying in to Singapore the inter-island roads and highways are lit up like a PacMan path. Yet even with these differences, there are striking similarities like sports stadiums in every major city and agricultural patches of parks and fields.

Yet it is so very different – If Maine isn’t the whitest state in the United States it has got to be in the top 3. If that is the case in Maine it is the OPPOSITE here. If I’ve encountered more than 20 obviously Caucasian people I’d say I was lying.

Suddenly it is like that four-square Sesame Street game, One of These Things is Not Like The Others. To me, everything else is different. But to everyone else the only thing different is me.

Internet service is a luxury for most places not a staple – Honestly, I am Save Drafting this post every 4th sentence. *save* After I wrote the draft in Live Writer. And continued it on my iPod after my computer died. The free wireless here at Changi is shotty at best, though it is free which is bounds beyond Narita and Detroit. My 13 hour flight to Tokyo and my 6 hour flight to Singapore definitely didn’t have wireless either. I had to find those random things to do that DIDN’T involve a connection. Like riding the walkway team back and forth twice in the Detroit airport tunnel. And read. Books. On my Kindle.

Airplane food and service aren’t the devil – I was warned all around “Ugh, airplane food is terrible” and that I would be constantly waiting and frustrated. Either I had the travel trip that was the exception to this rule or I have way lower expectations than most people. Airplane food is not a five-course meal, so I was near floored when I received 3 hot meals and a lunch sandwich from Detroit to Singapore. And the worst behaved flight crew? PWM to Detroit. Stateside. Granted, it was 8 AM, I can be cranky that time of day too.

International travel is simply awesome – This is the concept that leaves me at a loss for words. I keep playing the Louis CK rant on Conan over and over in my head instead, he does a much better job of grasping the reality of the situation.

…did you fly through the air? Incredibly? Like a bird? Did you partake in the miracle of human flight? YOU’RE FLYING. It’s amazing! Everybody on every plane should just constantly be going “OH MY GOD! WOW!” You’re flying. You’re sitting in a chair…in. the. sky.

Frankly I am rather humbled at the situation. Seriously humbled.

40 hours ago I was sitting in my parents living room packing my backpack and saying goodbyes. Now I am sitting in an airport that has a POOL ON THE ROOF on the other side of the planet. Can you even stop to imagine for just a moment how awesome that is.

Not even awesome like “Totally awesome, man” but awesome like AWE-SOME…it should FILL YOU WITH AWE each and every time you get on an airplane.

Even more when it is an international flight.

I love being so humbled and awed by these experiences – Sure, I worry sometimes that my enthusiasm and excitement for this trip wears on the nerves of cultured and experienced international travelers. My email to Dan, Ian & David upon preparing to leave included the subject line: OH MY GOD MY PLANE TAKES OFF IN 4 HOURS!!! (Yes, with that many exclamation marks)

I hope that I never lose this sense of wonder at the novelty and strange comfort of international travel. I know it could (probably will) eventually happen.

But I hope it isn’t for a really really REALLY long time.

If you want more posts like these, with journal-like observations and stories of my travel adventures, you want to make sure to sign-up for my free email newsletter. With weekly tales of shenaniganry and observations on not-so-average life, you will feel like you are coming along on the journey in my backpack’s side pocket. Look forward to seeing you in email!

Before you read any further DO THIS EXERCISE

1. Grab a piece of scrap paper and a pen/pencil.
2. Look through the word search
3. Write down the FIRST four words that you see in the sea of letters

Don’t analyze, don’t question, don’t look for particular words. Just write down the first four words.

Didja do that?

It’ll be important to “get” the rest of this post!

I offered up this graphic and call on my Tumblr and Twitter earlier this week.

The first four words you see describe you.

This reality both affirmed and terrified people.

Some were comfortable and, dare I say, happy with their word choices.

Others were torn. Angsty. Unhappy. A number asked me if they could change their words. If they saw one word but it was actually part of another did they “Do it wrong?”

It is a funny thing about exercises like this. The snap reaction of decision without thought and analysis reveal the purest sense of our present mindset. This includes whether we are sleep deprived, just got good/bad news,

My words were: Happy, Patient, Peaceful, Witty.

My immediate comment was how wrong it was for me to see patient, because I am possibly one of the most impatient people I’ve ever known. I joked that it must be patient in the medical sense of the word cause I had a cold.

Yet my friend Jodi pointed out to me that patient makes perfect sense for me. I am extremely aware of the idea of patience, and constantly working to exercise it in my life since it is against my nature. I probably pick out moments that I need to be patient in more than others, because of this awareness of my short-coming.

I don’t think that the words are necessarily an exact manifestation of who you are.

There is no right or wrong way to do this exercise. Nor is there any right or wrong answer.

But the results, if you take some time to think about them (with a very open mind) can certainly tell you a lot about where you are in life. Right now. In this exact and present moment.

What were your words? And what do you think of them?

Photo Credit – http://leetakeuchi.com/