Homeless, Jobless, and Content
written on August 6th
Ask the Google for advice or support to
reach your goal and you will be utterly overwhelmed with quotes, photos, blogs,
how-to formulas, and advice. These are helpful references for life, and I love
to collect the quotes. They inspire me to keep going.
In November of 2009, I started applying for
the Peace Corps. Today, the 6th of August, 2015 that adventure
ended. For the last 6 years, the driving force of my energy has been to reach
this very moment. I can’t even begin to tell you how wonderful it has been and
how much I have learned. I am incredibly grateful and overwhelmed by the amount
of love and support shown to me by Panamanians, Americans, and fellow
Volunteers. Peace Corps really is the toughest job you'll ever love.
But what happens now?
Let me be real with you for a bit. I don’t
have a plan. I don’t know where I will live. I don’t really know what kind of
job I want to do, and I am grateful that I qualify for medicaid for health
insurance. I don’t know how to use a smart phone, let alone set up a plan for
one and pay the bill. I don’t know what city, state, or country I want to live
in. I don’t know if I want to go to grad school and if I did, what I would
study.
What am I working for? What is my goal?
Where am I going with my life?
Three years in Panama has changed the way I
look at everything, and potential life plans I had before no longer seem to
fit. More unsettlingly, I realize now how dramatically a person's values,
desires, and perspective can change in just a few short years. Perhaps there is
no such thing as a life plan.
Reaching a goal comes with a great rush of
dopamine, but it is very short lived. The reality is that after a few minutes
or hours, maybe even give it a day or so,
you’re left with this unnerving feeling of...nothing. It’s like being
lost in your hometown, or having to give an impromptu speech on a foreign
topic. The anxiety is real. I hesitate to publish this post because I am afraid
of the ulcers and cardiac stress it will put on my parents, whose primary goal
has always been to keep me safe, secure, and provided for.
However, for a woman that has been
incredibly goal-oriented and driven since about ten years old, there’s another
feeling too… freedom.
I don’t have an office to be at on Monday.
I don’t have a supervisor to report to or a deadline to meet. I don’t have a
house to clean or rent to pay. I have no bills to pay right now at all. I don’t
have clients or children or pets to care for. I have a backpack, hammock, and
shoes. I have 2,236.4 miles from the Darien to Mexico City and nowhere to be
for a few months. I have enough money for bus tickets, food, a flight home, and
maybe even a few other adventures. I have at least one good friend with whom to
share the journey, and know I will make more along the way.
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