IWOM – We Know No Limits.com

I can hardly believe I’ve been back in Australia six months. When did that happen? I still remember how I felt during my last week in Bangkok – the last stop of my 12month IWOM adventure.

It was horrible. I knew everyone expected me to feel excited to be returning “home” and about to see all my family and friends again but I didn’t want to go. Why? Because it felt like life as I’d come to know and love it, was ending.

Dinner in Bangkok

I know they say that with endings come new beginnings but that wasn’t how I felt at the time. The other day I read something I’d written the night before my flight to Australia that sums things up quite well;

At the thought of heading back to Australia my mind goes blank. I was feeling, I guess, a kind of denial two weeks ago, denial that all this time has passed and now I’m expected to go back and act like nothing’s happened.

Now I feel nothing and think nothing – seems I’ve finally found a way to clear my mind. Perhaps I’ll even be able to meditate now, if I think of going back – wards.

Kind of depressing I know but hey, I’d just spent almost 18 months in total, going wherever I wanted, whenever I wanted and living exactly as I like to – on my own time. I always say I have no rules and that was a time when it was absolutely true.

Heading back to Australia felt like going backwards. I knew that no matter what I’d seen and done, everyone there would be the same, doing the same things and expecting me to fit back into those lives. I also knew I planned to work for a while. Well, I had to so I made it my plan; and I knew that would place me back into the day-to-day I so wanted to avoid, faster than anything else could.

Don’t get me wrong. I love Australia and the outdoor lifestyle, I love my family and my friends, I just didn’t ever love the day-to-day grind we fall into or the fact that people worry about the little things and forget to make time to have a bit of fun, to live in the moment – dare I say, noone knows when it may be the last.

By the way, I felt guilty too. Guilty toward all the people I knew were in Australia looking forward to my return. I did want to spend time with them, I just wanted them to come to me in a different location so I could share some of my excitement and experiences with them. Selfish? Maybe, but it was with good intent.

Sad face-leaving Bangkok

Well, as I said about endings…new beginnings. I put myself on the plane and arrived in Australia with my mind set on what I was doing next. I don’t tend to think in terms of “I might do…,” I tend to think and say out loud, “I’m doing …” That often prompts people to suggest I may be disappointed if things don’t turn out but I laugh at the thought because the way I see it, if I’ve said it, I’ll do it.

I guess my thoughts on being positive are another story for me to tell but let’s just say I think Pollyanna had the right idea in finding a positive side to everything.

So, my new beginning? It’s underway and almost on schedule – my schedule so actually yes, it’s on schedule. I stepped off the plane and said I was staying to work a few months, catch up with everyone then return to the UK by Christmas.

Enjoying the Aussie lifestyle

It took a few weeks longer to find temp work and the rates aren’t as good as they once were (apparently due to the global financial crisis) so I won’t be in the UK for Christmas. The Pollyanna side to that is, I’ll now spend Christmas and New Year with family and friends plus maybe miss the worst of the UK winter by returning in February. You see, it is easy to find a bright side.

 FYI: definition of Pollyanna

(source: http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/Pollyanna )

 Noun – an excessively or blindly optimistic person.

Adjective – Also, Pollyannaish, unreasonably or illogically optimistic: some Pollyanna notions about world peace.

Origin: from the name of the child heroine created by Eleanor Porter (1868-1920), American writer

13 Responses to “Time flies”