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On originality and finding new inspirations

IMG_2487The other day I posted this photo and it got me thinking about just how true it is.

If you want an uncomplicated and straightforward life, don’t travel.

Travel, I find complicates everything. It makes you question all, makes you want to live in a bold new way, and makes you want to make lasting changes. If ever I feel that I’m stuck or in need of new inspirations, I travel. Travel ruined me and ruined me at a young-ish age, but its something I wouldn’t ever want to change or take back.

Travel doesn’t have to be far or involve multiple flights. Just the act of moving can become a sort of mediation and a way to clear the clutter from my mind.

These days, I have found that I find inspiration in the simplest things. I haven’t been able to sleep through the night in over a month because I lie wide-eyed in bed and start thinking of all the things, projects, people, etc.

I want to see and experience and touch all of it and I don’t want it to stop after these three months of summer traveling.

Over the past several years of my life, this has become a sort of routine –> find something, pack a backpack, leave for Asia for three months (sometimes more), get overly inspired, return home –> repeat.

For now, when I think of the future, it involves living much as I am now –> New languages, sights, sounds, tastes, and nights spent not sleeping (solely because I’m just too excited to go to bed). After all these years of traveling and living like this I was afraid that this summer would finally break me, I’d be done with it, and want to embrace the uncomplicated. If anything, the opposite has been true and Burma has reminded me once again of how much I love this life and this style of living.

“I don’t believe in originality. You take inspiration from whatever moves you and you find your voice in those things.” – Tim Walker

I’d give up a good night’s sleep and fast internet any day if it meant I could feel this alive and this much like myself.

The India I used to know

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Made it to Delhi at long last!

I got to Greg’s place this afternoon after a long, long journey. It took over 24 hours on a non-A/C train to get from Mumbai to Delhi.

Unlike this, the journey reminded me of the India that I used to know. The India I both love and hate.

I can honestly say, regardless of the number of trains I’ve taken like this in India, I always forget how hard it can be. I always forget that being a woman in India is hard. I always forget what hot really is. . .

It’s 115 degrees (F) in Delhi today.

. . . And I haven’t stopped sweating since I left Mumbai.

I woke up this morning and realized I only had five more hours to go. I was covered in new bruises, new smells, but I quickly realized there was still a lot of good. I had friends to look after me and share their breakfast with and help me down from my high bunk. . .

And once I arrived, nothing compared to the great sense of victory that washed over me. I walked into Greg’s apartment and didn’t know what to do with myself. I went to the shower and stood there, stunned.

The good that comes from train travel is that there is time. Lots of time. Time, to think, breathe and meditate.

For me, I thought of and questioned my life decisions a good deal, I thought about chaffing, I thought about what the word resilient means, and I thanked God for music and the occasional breeze that came through the window. . .

Now, it is time to celebrate the good. The victories both big and small and for being here, safe and comfortable even in extreme heat.

*Note: Still feeling incredibly dehydrated, so hope some of this makes sense. Too tired and hot to even bother reading over this again.

[Photos: Paschmin Express from Mumbai to Delhi//Grace Farson]