Start by getting out of your comfort zone.
For me, this meant hopping on a plane and flying to a Central American country, leaving my loved ones thousands of miles away in favor of a city where the land, language, and culture was new and unfamiliar. I blasted out of my comfort zone at 550 miles an hour with an overpacked suitcase and nerves abuzz with the uncertainty.
But you don’t need a passport or a plane ticket to do something different. You may not even need a car. Talk to someone new at the end of your afternoon class. Wear the skirt that’s been hanging in your closet for months–the one that you loved in the pale light of the dressing room but that you have since grown too self-conscious to flaunt publicly. Try plantains for the first time and realize that the texture is a mixture of baby food and paste, and then use all of your self-control to keep from spitting it back out into your napkin—or, alternatively, discover that you really love plantains, as it seems most people do who are not me.
Dare to push yourself.
I climbed a volcano this past weekend. A real, actual, lava-burbling-beneath-your-feet volcano of the sort that could potentially spew molten rock and ash into the sky above your head at any given moment. The first half-mile of the hike was torturous, it was the kind of sharp incline that makes you feel your pulse as it thrums in your throat. After that, though, it leveled out a good deal, and though fog- obscured, our view of the land below us for a majority of the morning, we eventually got a clear look at both the volcanic peak looming overhead and of the rolling green patchwork that spread out below us like an enormous tapestry.
I have always been a fan of hiking (though the burning in my calves sometimes tells a different story), partially because there is a sense of being connected to something much bigger than yourself, but also because there is an incredible sense of victory involved at the end. Whether it’s a peak you’re climbing or a path through the forest or the slope of an active volcano, when you’re done you get to say, “I did it!”—but only if you do. You’ll never get anywhere if you don’t first choose to go, even if it’s different, even if you have no idea what to expect. Even if maybe it scares you a little. Sometimes a little leap is all you need to take you a long way.
Choose to go with the flow.
After our hike up Volcán de Pacaya, my fellow students and I made the three-hour drive to Playa Monterrico, a beach on the Pacific coast of Guatemala with black sand beaches and a large population of stray but friendly dogs. We had about two hours of daylight left to enjoy the warm water and warm weather, perfect for a swim in the sea, and then about two hours more before the rain began.
And it came down hard.
Most of the rainstorms I’ve experienced in California knock politely on your rooftop before picking up the pace, a gentle haze of rainfall gradually working itself up to something a bit more substantial. The rain in Monterrico began with no such pretensions, dropping on us heavily, abruptly, and accompanied by an impressive sideshow of thunder and lightning. The deluge continued well into Sunday, in what a local woman mentioned was the first major rain of the season. Go figure.
While it certainly wasn’t the way that any of us had anticipated spending our weekend on the coast, we didn’t let it slow us down. Some dove into the wind-tossed ocean waves while I taught a friend how to swim in the shallow saltwater pool of the hotel. After awhile, we didn’t even notice the downpour.
There are things that happen that are out of our control, both when we’re stepping out of our comfort zone and when we are cozily inside of it. Instead of fighting against the new, the different, the unexpected, my best advice embrace it as well as you can, particularly if there isn’t much you can do to change it. It’s not always easy to accept what comes, but it can be a lot more rewarding and a lot less frustrating if you do. Being brave means choosing, despite the odds, to make the best of your circumstances and to foster the best in yourself. It’s rarely easy, but it’s nearly always worth it.
