I was sitting in a tea house at Gosaikunda lake in Nepal, reading and sipping my ginger tea, when I could not help but eavesdrop on a conversation fellow travellers were having nearby. A couple from Colorado were telling an Israeli girl about their trip to Asia:
“We travelled to South East Asia, spent a month in Myanmar, which was truly fascinating, crossed over to Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam before flying to India. We’ve done a couple of treks in Nepal and are now planning to go to China before finishing our six months' adventure in Sri Lanka.”
“Wow! It must be incredible to take six months out of your life!”
Before I could stop myself, I jumped into the conversation. You see, I knew very well that she meant they were lucky to be able to take time off work, to have no other responsibilities tying them down, to have the means to travel for six months but I could not let something like this slip:
Take time OUT of your LIFE?
I beg to disagree. Tim and Lenore, a sociology professor and a physiotherapist, took six months to experience adventure, to challenge their comfort zones, to enjoy spectacular sunrises and sunsets, to discover the mysterious Burmese culture, to see if they really can eat dal bhat every day of the trek without getting sick of the monotonous Nepali diet, to meet people they’d never otherwise come across at home in Colorado, to take part in a random pub quiz some crazy Russian tourist organised for a bunch of trekkers… They did not take time OUT of their lives, they took time IN.
***
Last week a friend of mine was taken to hospital with a suspected stroke. (He is OK.) He is barely 30. This unwelcome news was a painful reminder how fragile our lives are and how important it is to make sure to live today and focus on what makes you happy.
If you were offered 6 months "for free" in a parallel universe, what would you do with your time IN?
“We travelled to South East Asia, spent a month in Myanmar, which was truly fascinating, crossed over to Laos, Cambodia and Vietnam before flying to India. We’ve done a couple of treks in Nepal and are now planning to go to China before finishing our six months' adventure in Sri Lanka.”
“Wow! It must be incredible to take six months out of your life!”
Before I could stop myself, I jumped into the conversation. You see, I knew very well that she meant they were lucky to be able to take time off work, to have no other responsibilities tying them down, to have the means to travel for six months but I could not let something like this slip:
Take time OUT of your LIFE?
I beg to disagree. Tim and Lenore, a sociology professor and a physiotherapist, took six months to experience adventure, to challenge their comfort zones, to enjoy spectacular sunrises and sunsets, to discover the mysterious Burmese culture, to see if they really can eat dal bhat every day of the trek without getting sick of the monotonous Nepali diet, to meet people they’d never otherwise come across at home in Colorado, to take part in a random pub quiz some crazy Russian tourist organised for a bunch of trekkers… They did not take time OUT of their lives, they took time IN.
***
Last week a friend of mine was taken to hospital with a suspected stroke. (He is OK.) He is barely 30. This unwelcome news was a painful reminder how fragile our lives are and how important it is to make sure to live today and focus on what makes you happy.
If you were offered 6 months "for free" in a parallel universe, what would you do with your time IN?
Lenore and Tim at Gosaikunda Lake, photo by Jana Bakunina
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