We grow up with the idea of “I want to travel for work because I can make money and see many places around” no one tells you how stressful is it travelling for work… travel should be only for pleasure.
After more or less 8 years with a lifestyle where taking a flight sounds like taking a bus, sleeping in different hotels every day it is just normal, eating in restaurants of any type, washing clothes at the laundry service, meeting frends in every locations in the World, never could commit any long term plan, running to catch cabs, trains, airplanes it is just daily stuff because time is precious, your common language is english and even when you land in your home town you can’t really realize your feet are on the ground and your parents can’t understand what are you talking about.
The reality is that during these years, we are just wasting our energy and time, travelling can open your mind, because you see different things, but in the same time, you lose the contact with your friends, your family, your passion… you don’t have time to dedicate to yourself, to build a life, to build some stable relationships…
You come back from your trips and you realize your friends are already away with their plans, your parents’ changed from black to white and they are busy planning their retirement, your brother is always away for his job, you don’t have any one waiting for you, not even a dog or cat or a domestic fish. You don’t have any hobbies, no gym membership, no idea of what are planned at the cinema, no idea of any thing you can do, if it not sleeping and resting, getting ready for the next trip.
When you finally decide to stop it! Are we still on time to rebuild our lost important things?
Yes, sometimes… and the process is painful and takes so long.
You never can really stop your dynamic flying life, you will miss the time you were taking a beer in HK with a friend and the day after you are in Shanghai for a morning meeting and then leave for somewhere else… if you stay in one place too long you will feel missing a ingredient in your life, so you will plan some week ends out in some capital cities nearby.
Rebuild the lost connections with the local friends is difficult, they normally are local and you already changed to be an international citizen, with different points of view of everything.
Some very good friends are married, with kids and busy…
You can try to know some new friends, and then it is difficult to ignore you were having so many fun with your friend in HK, Singapore, KL, NY, Tokyo, London, Paris, ect… the experience is so much different and sometime you happen to questioning if “am I normal?”
You try to date some guys in your home town, the ones that you remember at your teen age were so cool, now probably they are so boring and idiot and some times really nothing to talk with.
You happen to fall in love with people that are doing your same previous lifestyle, but you realize they can never plan any thing with you and you need stability…
Your parents look like very worried for you, but they don’t know what to do to help you, they only know you are lost with some problems that at their generation were not existing.
It is frustrating! And this is the beginning…
Not sure this is the right decision, as long as it’s worth to try… this is a psicological shock and in some way we need to over pass.
Some deep thought from my last long sickness (5 days in the bed, without meeting any one and without putting out my feet from my home), our body sometimes needs rest, need to lay down and do nothing, your home is so warm, with the lovely voices of your parents at the kitchen working with the only objectives to feed you until you can’t eat any more, they don’t know how to solve your frustration, but they love you and this is so comforting. Some times you need nothing to be happy, you only need simplicity and to reset your mind for a bit.
Switch off!
I think there are process for every moment in our life, can be tough or easy… important is to remember the reason why we did a certain choice and think deep what we really need, at the end…
Qiyan's Blog 