(an English blog)
The most asked question.. tricky question, because what is landed? Is that the moment that you get back to your daily routine, join the ratrace and take everything for granted? But wasn’t that one of the reasons to hop on this adventure: go back to the basics, forget about the days, be in the moment.
So I struggle with it; I don’t want to get back to daily life as if it is normal. On one hand I have to join in, that is how our society works and I do need to pay the rent and want to eat. On the other hand I try to take with me the insights I got from this trip. And by taking the time to get adjusted, I figure out what I learned from this trip and what my take-aways are.
On forehand I wrote a blog about the what/why of this adventure (blog: Fjällfarare vita band). Let’s get back to what I expected and what I hoped to get from these days solo in the mountains
What I expect:
- I expect that I go bananas from the, infinite, white world around me
- I expect that I consider myself very pathetic because it is cold
- I expect that I get angry with myself if I make mistakes
- I expect that there are moments that I think: if I just continue than I’m faster
Funny fact: these expectations never crossed my mind!
What I hope to get:
- I hope that I can submerge myself in the white world and that I’m fine with it that it continues after the next hill
- I hope that I can hug the cold and be comfortable in it
- I hope that I can give myself the space to make mistakes and learn instead that I get angry with myself
- I hope that I don’t think in time/speed but make choices that are related to enjoy it rather than rush towards an end
Funny fact 2: I got it all!
But how did I manage that? Because even on the road I sometimes fell into the old expectations but I could stay away from them.
My objective was to achieve my above “hopes” and I had given myself a lot of time. The time gave me room to fix the mental stuff along the trip – there was no rush so I could confront them. And it also meant that if I didn’t like it anymore, it would be okay to go home. Or if I liked it more to go to the south than being northbound, that would be okay. Finishing upnorth at Trerikröset wasn’t the goal of this trip.
I guess one important factors was that I did not have a ticket back and I had cleared my agenda for a very long period. So there was no time cap; in my previous adventures there was a time or distance that I (preferably) wanted to reach. In this way I could live in the moment instead of planning to be somewhere/sometime – and that feeling is indescribable.
Getting back to the question “have you landed?” – yes I’ve landed, the fact that I am not living every moment in the moment is one of the signs. I miss this feeling but everyday I try to get my moment of being in the moment, and that can be anywhere/anytime. And balancing that with my daily life is a big challenge at the moment. And no, I’m not planning new big adventures because that would be an easy escape of reality. So I undertake small adventures, I’m a lot in nature (although it is still in the Randstad) and I’m standing still (literally) at random moments.
