Life paradoxes (or not) ☺
I’m about to finish my fist ‘vacation’ after my very first sailing season of “Sailing Aquarius”. Naturally I’ve missed my friends and family so much! I’m very grateful to Ken and to our new lifestyle as I was able not only see my beloved ones in San Diego and Las Vegas, but I also had a chance to go to my native Lithuania and see my “long time no see” friends and family with my adorable nephew, who is 4 right now and last time I saw him for couple of days when he was 2. This is separate story how much I would like to see him much more than just couple days or weeks every two years, or spend more time with my 90 year old grandmother, but that’s life and majority’s reality – either you have money, but little time or reverse – plenty of time and less money…
But time and money relationship is not the main topic of this post, the thing I wanted to share is the reaction of some of my friends, that confuses me a little bit and makes me smile as sometimes I’m not sure what to say, but I can say it here J
Most common 2 things I hear is: “aren’t you bored” and “I couldn’t do this”. Of course there’s the regular “do you get seasick?”, but this one question is not surprising me at all and it’s easy & quick to answer “no” J
So let me address the other two that makes me smile:
-AREN’T YOU BORED? – my first and most natural reaction is “why”?
During our around the world sailing journey I have to do same things to take care of our house/boat as on land – do groceries, laundry, cook, clean even some paperwork and so on. Then my other girly things like beauty procedures witch most of the time I do myself ; then of course our regular “free time” when we watch series, movies, shows, read books etc. Let’s not forget the “work” part – researching information about new countries/places we will visit, plot the routes, find out best anchorages, taking care and maintaining our boat, making videos and the whole sailing itself… And all the other activities, that takes so much of our times – i.e. snorkeling, swimming, looking for a grocery store or the local market, meeting new friends and sharing the stories, staring at the starts or beautiful sunset, touring the islands and exploring what locals has to offer – special foods, shows, dishes or traditions…
With all honesty I have to admit – the speed of life is much slower on the boat… but we rarely hit traffic jams either or have to stand in a long after hours queue in a grocery store… Which I have to admit I don’t miss a bit. And to be honest every “routine” thing like grocery shopping or going out for dinner is a small adventure itself as you have to find the place and then hope you will find what you shopping for, otherwise you will have to use local knowledge and your imagination and come up with alternative cooking recipes along the way, that I can ensure you – it does not get boring at all… So why I should get bored in general??? Do you get bored often during your vacation? I guess it’s easy if you don’t leave your hotel room… What my husband brought to my attention is ask the people who ask this question same question – “aren’t you bored?” – living many years in the same place, working same work, seeing same people with same problems for years and years? But I guess that can be a touchy topic for many of us and I wouldn’t want to make them feel bad or sad… Plus – all of us are different and crave different things, some of us need certainty to feel happy others crave adventure and there’s nothing wrong with that, as I can tell I don’t do very well with monotony – that’s what I feel is slowly killing my soul, and therefore I deliberately chose this lifestyle for a while, so there’s no judgment at all…
Now let’s talk about the “I COULDN'T DO THIS”. I get it J With all due respect and understanding. I know this for a fact that majority couldn’t do this because of so many reasons – they don’t do well on the water and that would be dangerous for their health, they have different aspirations in their life, they have kids who need to go to school, they have careers to build, some don’t have financial capabilities or their ideal life is the one surrounded by their family and friends – all of them are very real and valid as well as nonnegotiable. And I respect that. And I do not interrupt them as they tell about their day to day life and their challenges and daily joys repeating same thing “I couldn’t do this”, because first I understand it’s not my life or choice, second I still interested about someone close to me and third – even if I feel my need to express that “I couldn’t do this” I would not feel the need to repeat that more than 3 times as I would assume that my friend is intelligent person and does not need constant repeat to get the idea :D What is a bit annoying it’s usually not the person who says that during our 1:1 conversation, as it’s not difficult for me to switch the topic and talk about the things we have in common. This usually happens in the group conversations as majority of group still are interested in our sailing around the world journey and eager to hear more and this one person keeps interrupting and assuring all the group that they “couldn’t do this”… every 2 minutes… Then I’m not sure why they keep listening to me rather than finding somebody else to talk to JJ
From my working, coaching and general life experience I’m very aware of different needs, people, circumstances and life stages and they all are valid and very real to each of us. Each of us has it’s timing, value and sometimes message or lesson. And by this blog post I have no intentions to harm or insult anyone, as I dearly love the people who are close to me and Ken and I appreciate their friendship, including the ones who after me not living in Lithuania for the past 9 years still find time in their busy lives to meet me on my usually short visits and that is so heartwarming to see my childhood friends, which we can’t make anymore as we grow and move and sometimes lose the connection. I appreciate all of your time and I’m fascinated to see them grow and hear about their lives and stories. And after all
– it’s only the few ones form all the friends and family with whom I had so much joy and fun getting together and it would be a huge misunderstanding if you would think that majority of people asked this or said this. It’s just a few ones that I either did not see the point on talking too much about this or only the ones who sincerely not sure how this lifestyle looks like.
On the other hand, I guess this is some of the side effects of this life stage in my life – I’m afraid that some of us are so “molded” by the system that we think that travelling around the world is more boring than commuting to work especially when statistics show that very high percentage of people actually dislike their jobs… Is this just my observation? Am I missing something obvious here? I guess this could be as a newbie questions I come across sometimes :)
I hope you will point me out if you see me missing something important or let me know if you find this not true and I will reach out and apologize, as again – I value ALL of my friends and family, even if you have something to add – let me know! And… If you want to know more frequently about our journey and our quest for more meaningful life check our videos – on this website here or Subscribe to our YouTube Channel as we do our best to post videos every 2 weeks.
…and I still hope that there will be a time when we will write more of posts as well…
With lots of love - Zivile
