Two cents Tuesday: I'm not in La La Land anymore

I meant to post this Tuesday, but fell asleep with my computer in my lap because I was getting up early to go SURFING in the morning. I won't brag, buuutttt I DID get up on every wave (pretty sure I can now put 'surfer girl' in my insta bio). Then life got in the way and I was going, going, going, until this very moment, as I sit in my new Córdoba apartment where I'm forcing myself to publish before I do anything. Truthfully, now that I'm not getting sick at every turn, not posting means that I'm busy out doing tons of awesome stuff that will hopefully inspire my writing. So, without further ado...

Month four was the best yet, but also a roller coaster. I now understand the really high highs and the super low lows. Don’t worry, I’m actually monumentally happier now than I would have thought a few weeks back, so I’m going to try to summarize all the things that invaded my everyday thoughts and the activities that made last month what it was- bear with me.

--
Let me start by saying Peru is incredible. I know I use this word a lot, but I think Lima and the surrounding cities have surpassed my love for Mexico and Colombia in a way I didn’t think was possible. Looking back, it’s funny how we came down to sea level from Medellin and this is where I seemed to enter my ‘valley of despair.’ (WHAT THEY WARNED US ABOUT!!) Then, after the godsend of a visit from my best friend, I literally and figuratively scaled back up the mountain to my happy place.

April was my birthday month, which for some reason I hate. I guess it’s because birthdays are about attention and I hate when the attention is on me- I get all uncomfortable and weird and I’d rather just not. Well, my RY fam came together to make me feel special in a not-too-over-the-top way (Curious George stuffed animal and Bieber concert included) and I am truly grateful for these amazing humans, per usual. But my loathsome attitude towards my day of birth got me thinking: why is it really that I hate this day so much? My conclusion at the time: I don’t deserve to be celebrated. Again, bear with me. All of us on this trip are going through life changes and realizations, concurrently, which certainly makes for an intriguing group dynamic, but also confusion and inner strife along the way.

Age is a major factor in this trip. Not from the perspective of others, but from what you will experience, and what you will reap from it. The journey (I swear I’m not ripping off ‘The Bachelor’) I’m on is not the same as another's, and what I find of worth during my Remote Year is of no value to some. I thought I would be on a quest to find myself- but instead I'm actively learning to accept myself. The main difficulty is in not comparing myself to the outstanding individuals I’m surrounded by. That’s what I mean when I say I don’t deserve to be celebrated- what have I done to improve the world around me? In comparison to my friends here desigining new apps or pioneering start-ups with their uber creativity, not a whole lot. That was how I felt three weeks ago, at least.

Maybe it's my age that brings the insecurities out- I feel like I don’t measure up against the more life-experienced humans on RY. I’ve been counting down the time I have left to develop traits that I find worthy of admiration and respect. I want to absorb so much of what is around me: ambition, passion, sense of humor, knowledge, interesting skills, and confidence. And maybe, to an extent, I can. I hope this community will continue to inspire, motivate, and help shape who I grow into. But I can't forget to remember who I am at the core of my being. Yes, I am drastically flawed, but I find that the traits I love most about others are their flaws- their beautiful flaws and how they make someone uniquely, unapologetically them. Because without our flaws, we're just boring. And that's my biggest fear.

--
In the midst of all this ‘self-actualization’- or lack thereof- I had to leave Lima for a work meeting that was halfway across the world. I tried to look on the bright side, because hey, I get to go to London for free, but I was pretty disappointed to leave the ocean and sunshine.

Maybe it was spillover of the thoughts I was having prior to the trip, but as I sat in that conference room for two days, I kept asking myself: is this what I want to do?

I was once faced with a situation where someone close to me said they were depressed. They were supposedly depressed about their work and, in a nutshell, where it would take them in life. I get it- it’s a typical young adult life crisis, and we’re not actually depressed. But not knowing what direction our lives may go and questioning whether the path we choose will lead us to monotony or happiness, is a scary time. So basically, at that moment, in that conference room, I felt that fear staring me literally in the face (in the form of sales materials, quarterly goals, and all my coworkers). I wasn’t confident I was meant to be there.

But after a particular exercise, where I beat out an entire table of seasoned industry executives, I was reminded that I AM good at what I do. I was meant to be in that room with those incredibly intelligent and talented people, and I’m going to utilize my position within the company to learn to be the best I can be.

You can probably see the correlation between this epiphany and my life-crisis back ‘home’ in Lima; I needed to start realizing my self-worth (RY is full of these little epiphanies, it's great). Well, life decided to give me one last swift kick to the gut in the form of a TERRIBLE travel day(s) back to Lima. Let’s just say, don’t ever tell yourself that things couldn’t possibly get any worse… because they will. More on this later.

--
Upon my return, and with the arrival of my best friend Abbey, was the start of an amazing 10 days. We ate delectable seafood, toured a pisco vineyard, went to the beach of “Baghdad” aka Punta Negra (Google images is quite misleading, but it’s a beautiful place nonetheless), she went paragliding, and then came the long-awaited trip to Cusco and Aguas Calientes. We somehow managed to avoid getting altitude sickness (hell. yes.), tasted guinea pig and alpaca as a Peruvian mountain delicacy, partied at a gnarly Cusco hostel where our crew won ALL the contests, regardless of our status as guests (which we weren’t), hiked through the monumental ancient ruins of Machu Picchu, and had good times and laughs with each other that I hadn’t had in a while.

But the day that took the cake: Rainbow Mountain.

I remember, before starting Remote Year, reading a blog post about a RY participant who decided to do Rainbow Mountain. It sounded intense- it was clearly a hard hike, and she had fallen off her horse and gotten hurt- which did not entice me to follow suit. Fast-forward 5 months and a few of us decide, last minute, to organize this Rainbow Mountain hike, because we’re already here in Cusco and when are we ever going to come back to do this? I knew it was going to be tough and I also secretly thought it wouldn’t be worth all the trouble in the end, but we went anyway.

‘Tough’ is the biggest understatement of a description of the Rainbow Mountain climb I’ve ever heard. It is not a hike, it is an intense, physically grueling ascent. The peak of Rainbow Mountain sits at 17,060 feet above sea level. To put this in comparison, Mount Kilimanjaro is 19,340 ft. Granted, you start the Rainbow mountain trek around 14,000 ft., but at this altitude, just breathing at a regular walking pace is labored and difficult. We had all the supplies- coca leaves to chew, oxygen tanks for when we got light-headed, horses to ride for a majority of the way- yet when we reached the top, I still felt like I was going to die and fall off the mountain.

But when you’re standing on that peak, after the hardest uphill climb of your life, you're smiling from ear to ear because you've accomplished something that you yourself didn't think was possible, especially on the way up- and even more so on the way back down. It could be the adrenaline, or more likely the endorphins. Or it could be that you just discovered you're stronger than you think.

I have never seen a more beautiful sight in my entire life. I thought the images online would end up being cooler than the real thing. WRONG. I was so wrong. Even my pictures don’t do the view from up there justice. On one side, the snowy peak of Ausangate (the 5th tallest mountain in Peru), on the other, the multicolored slopes of Rainbow Mountain. Beyond the breathtaking view (which, literally, took my breath away), our group made the experience that much better; everyone supportive, everyone positive, everyone feeling like we had just conquered the world together. Even words can’t do my Rainbow Mountain experience justice- just know that it was a really high high on my Remote Year thus far, and I got to share that moment with my best friend.

--

This week, our last in Lima, I was present for multiple conversations where our thoughts on wild-month-four came up. Its funny how we're all going through similar points of sadness, questioning, uncertainty, reflection, transformation, growth, etc. Maybe it's the realization that patience and acceptance are two very hard things to learn, maybe it's wondering why they haven't found their 'people' yet, maybe it's the feeling of loneliness as a close friend decides to leave the program, or maybe they're struggling with the possibility of leaving themselves. Whatever it may be, and whether or not we, as a community, notice it on a daily basis, its there.

So here's what I think: Let's get out of our own heads ands extend a hand to those around us. When we all put our baggage in the middle of the circle, we'll probably realize our problems aren't so bad, but maybe the person's next to us are.

--
Now that I have spilled my life’s guts onto paper, I’ll give you some of my two cents:

1. If you are trying to get back to South America from London, make sure you have your exit ticket for the country you’re flying to next so that the airline doesn’t prevent you from boarding your flight home, forcing you to stay in an airport hotel until the next flight out 7 hours later.

2. Always quadruple check your departure terminal at LHR (and make sure you're not looking at the wrong column), because between terminals 2 and 4 is about a 10-12 minute UBER DRIVE, and you will have to run to get checked-in on time.

3. Don’t accidentally leave your work cell phone in said Uber, because they will force you to pay them cash just to bring it back (after you call a million times and BEG), making you even later to check-in for your flight, and causing your ATM card to be frozen because you forgot to tell the bank you were going to the UK.

4. Give yourself, like, 4 hours of leeway at LHR to make your flight because the gates are 25 minutes (one actual freaking mile) from security and they close off flights a half-hour before departure. This is NOT like chill AF South America.

4b. Once you finally make it to your designated middle seat for your 12-hour transatlantic plane ride and you find a very large non-English speaking man, half in your seat who refuses to scoot over, take a few deep breaths, go to sleep, and snore as loud as possible because, of course, you’re getting over a cold.

5. When you have the worst day ever and end up crying alone in the middle of an airport terminal, remind yourself that it COULD STILL GET WORSE, and one day (probably a week later), you will look back on this and laugh at how out-of-a-movie ridiculous it was.

5b. Upside to all of this: AirFrance serves chocolate croissants on morning flights, and I’ve now technically been to Paris.

--

Remote Year is no vacation and I’ve learned more about myself than I knew I was signing up for. But for that, I am grateful.