Unpacking

I am packing once again, now a ritual of realizing my personal minimum material needs and a challenge to reduce them.

I won’t be packing much.

The act itself is therapeutic, like tidying a room on a Sunday morning. Simultaneously, it initiates butterflies, demanding reflection on what may lie ahead and what I leave behind.

For the next two months, Nicaragua will be my home.

The thing is that I don’t know why I’m going.

I know what for and what I will be doing there. The pragmatic reasons for going are clear. But underneath, there is more. Contrary to everything else, exploring is one desire that I do not question. It feels like the right thing to do. Something in my gut yearns for it, always.

Why Nicaragua, though, I do not yet know. It chose me. As I write this, I realize that despite having been to many places,

I have never once chosen my destination.

The Push to go comes from within, and comes as easy as breathing does.

But the Pull, the destinations, are different. Maybe I’m on a plane to Europe since a dream is there, or I’m landing in Africa because that’s where the work is. Perhaps I’m on a train to a place where my heart was taken.

My gut tells me to go. But only in the end will the world will tell me why.

Some places I went to learn what it means to struggle or be hungry, and to break preconceptions. Others I went to find forgiveness or to learn what love is. Some I went to learn what exploration is, and to discover things bigger than I.

Many I went to just to learn what it means to leave.

So now I go to Nicaragua with plenty of reasons to go, but without truly knowing why. But I will soon, and so will you.

In this blog, I hope to share what I learn through discovery. Yes, some of this will be about travel and cultural experiences here on Earth, and others about exploring the Universe we all-too-often ignore.

But discovery isn’t limited to travel or being abroad, nor to this planet or space. It’s hidden in the oddities of life, in thoughts not yet thought, and words not yet spoken. It waits in reinvention of one’s life and in trying something new, eternally hiding just outside our comfort zone, only to be seen by those living in the present.

As an explorer of my own mind and the world around me, it’s my job and genuine pleasure to share my findings, in hope that we all learn from one another.

I was wrong.

It seems that I’m going to have a lot to unpack.