Wherever you go there you are…

Persisting with the idea that there are a load of aphorisms in need renovation, I’m sure most people have heard the saying: It’s the journey, not the destination. I would like to suggest that in fact it’s the adventure, there is no destination.

I interpret adventure in a much broader way than most people. For me it’s everything you do that pushes you outside the day-to-day. Meditation, yoga, a great book, exploring the deepest jungle, scuba diving, fly fishing, camping on your own, the list is endless. Some adventures are in your head, and some are a very physical experience, but all of them, large and small, promise a new way of seeing the world, a new way of seeing yourself, and a new way to connect the dots. To paraphrase a quote I came across years ago: do unusual things, meet peculiar people, go to strange places, and always remember, the more times at bat, the more hits. In summary, be an adventurer.

We are programmed for adventure. Curiosity is inextricably linked to adventure and curiosity is a critical component of a healthy mind. Unfortunately, the denatured modern world in which we live has blunted large numbers of people and made them incurious – passive observers of someone else’s adventure.

I’m not the only one who sees a problem, but to me, many of the prescriptions offered are products of what I call the paint-by-numbers world. Get a career, have this goal, do this and the outcome will be this (the highly transactional version), the list goes on. I have always remembered a Claire Danes line from many years ago when she played Angela Chase in My So-Called Life: “People always say you should be yourself, like yourself is this definite thing, like a toaster or something. Like you can know what it is even. But every so often I’ll have like, a moment, when just being myself in my life, right where I am, is like, enough.”

So my prescriptive (and I suppose it’s pretty simplistic from 30,000 feet) is the following: slow down, endeavor to be thoughtful (one needs to work at it), avoid gossip and embrace conversations about ideas, follow your heart (in a totally un-Hallmark cards sort of way), and recognize that though there are many good people in the world, there are also too many that want to monetize your attention in the worst possible ways – ways that will impede the expression of your intrinsic (and joyous) human spirit. And closing with yet another great line from the movie Mama Mia: It’s an adventure Harry. It’s good for you.