The Leap (part 1)

I am here. I did it. I took the leap. A real leap. The leapingest leap of my leaping life. This marks a historical point for me. And at the same time, I feel like I'm starting again — like I've done this before. This time, though, I get to tell the story from a place of privilege, from experience. I get to tell the story from a place of beauty and poetry. I begin this story in San Jose, Costa Rica. I'm here only for a few days; a place to land from my overnight flight from LAX. And after these few days, I'll go to the Caribbean side of the country and see what life there is to craft when I get there.

I was here before, in Costa Rica, in September 2022, for my first artist residency. But being here this time, I have less on my chest. I have less on my shoulders, by choice. I remember that that time, last year, my maleta was busted at the front wheel because it was so heavy. I'd been living through Mexico and Portugal for more than a year before I had come to Costa Rica. And before that, I'd been living and collecting things in Abu Dhabi for three years. And before that, it was Korea. But this travel history, as I can recall and articulate my stories, really began way back in 2012, when I first recognized that I had wings. Now I can say I know more or less how to use them. We'll see.

***

I'm sitting in the lobby of the condo building I arrived far too early at for check-in. But here we are. A perfect place to write. How did I get here? This redeye leap from LAX to SJO? But beyond that, before that, what have I been doing walking through the Earth, touching all the countries I felt call out to me? It’s not just the now 7 countries I’d chosen to take residence in, but the additional 25+ I’d chosen to venture through for tourism or curiosity. I don't exactly know, but what's sure to me is that it feels like at each step, I learned something I'd need to know for this here leap. Because at this moment, I don't know what's ahead of me. But what I do have is a cultivated capacity for adventure.

I'll admit, moving around the world the way I do makes me feel that I'm guided by a heavy hand. That my connection to the grand vortex of all that exists and moves is quite strong. The first time I felt the tether to the Earth tug in that umbilicordic way was in 2012 in Nigeria. I'd gone for a family visit and stayed longer because my university break was longer than those of my nuclear family members. Independent and eager, I traveled solo to visit extended family in different cities and villages. Beautiful experience. Then, I’d started to learn what home felt like for me. It's a feeling I would grow — cultivate, really — through all the different countries, cities, and cultures I'd travel through. Home for me is a feeling unconnected from a physical place.

In 2014, I studied overseas in Hong Kong, and wow. What an exhilarating experience. I remember one December in my father's village in Eastern Nigeria, we held a youth party during the Xmas festivities. My dad, happy when he's tipsy, found his way over to me, seated (probably with a child in my lap) observing the ginger in front of and around me. A signature grin touched both of his big ears and sweat beads glistened along his bald head in the incandescent hired lights. "Am I gonna die? I'm having too much fun!" he exclaimed, shooting his enthusiasm out into the night. And now I know where I got it from — that ability to create fun and extract joy from as much as I can. Looking back on my time in Hong Kong, I had so much fun, I felt I had already died and was in heaven. In a happy dream. All my moments in Hong Kong weren't happy, though. Of course not. For instance, I remember returning from a trip to Cambodia through Singapore and having the worst sinus infection. As the plane descended, finally, into Hong Kong's international airport, I was sure my brain was going to explode. I was already thinking about what a good story my situation made: if that’s how it was all going to end, at least I touched Cambodia and Singapore! It's almost 10 years later and I'm telling the story again now. Everything I look back on is cast in a golden light. Even the most dark situations.

***

Poco a poco, I'm coming to a place of comfort in talking about the hardest times in my life. A lot of the more painful experiences from earlier in my life are not felt so much as painful, but rather confusing, which I think is psychologically healthy and more accommodating for my mind. As I consider memory and emotion, I also consider self-compassion. Energy within my psyche represents itself as whatever it needs to in a way to maintain a homeostasis that works for my whole being in a given moment. If there are earlier traumas that I don't yet consider trauma, I'll become aware of just how affecting those situations were whenever it makes sense to. That's what's been happening anyway. Like in my efforts to end romantic relationships — really end them energetically. Like in dealing with my father's emotions. Like in dealing with anyone's emotions. And then in coming to understand my own emotions. It's really that part of the journey that has taken unique shape over the past few years of traveling. Traversing the inner landscape.

Wild ass place.

I took a similar leap to this one in 2017 when I moved to South Korea to teach English. I'd studied, lived, and worked in New York City for 6 years and was at a fuck it moment. I was 23 and kept hearing and really resonating with “you're not getting any younger.”  This urgency has always been in me. That feeling like "what exactly are you waiting for?". Going to Korea was a leap. I'd heard people taught English there and said they had a good time. I never listen for the horror stories — I don’t orient that way. At that point, I knew my travel experience would be unique to me. Looking back, I can see that what I was searching for in the eyes of those who told me that they'd traveled here or there, and that I should go, was genuine connection. Excitement. Enthusiasm. The stuff you can't fake. It's the magic of the light. Even (and especially) now, I don't care about someone's individual experience as indicative of what my experience in a certain country will be like. My experience will always be unique. My time in Korea made this idea feel real for me. Like, I went to this country and culture that was quite far from what I'd been used to, language included. No community, no friends. Only a job. Good. That helped. But, shit. Shyyyyttttt. What a trip. I was there for a year and in that year I came to know myself through the lenses of fun and let's see what happens when we do this. It was like a year of "yes" in some way. There was also a "yes" to saying "no" — continuously recalibrating to the freedom I’d claimed by moving to Korea initially when situations around me wanted to pull me out of my designed safe space. I only have the words for it now.

The moments leading up to this big Korea leap were the hardest moments. These were moments where so much of life as I knew it had crumbled. And I was back at my parent's house in California, sorting out myself only a few next steps. Not more than a few. In 2017, I threw out the idea of a career. At 23, I had already worked on three career tracks. I was disoriented and disappointed. Teaching English to Korean kiddos sounded fun and perfect. And it was. I suppose in the way that my memory has golden vision. No, but when I consider all my residencies and travels, my time in Korea was truly the most emotionally balanced and peaceful.

Perhaps it was this peace and balance that allowed deeper interests to emerge within me. My intellect became itchy for growth. And I had so much time on my hands after playing with kids for a few hours a day. I was writing a blog, documenting my experiences and sharing them with whomever would care to engage. I began studying linguistics and found a flow in it. Enjoyable. I then learned of an opportunity to take my wild self to the Middle East to teach writing at a university. Woah, me? Career-less but passion-full me? Why not? I asked myself, encouragingly. Why not? is a mantra I'd adopted when people asked me why I chose to study in Hong Kong in 2014. Why not? Aka Spirit's guidance. I told the story of my life experience and teaching philosophy in such a way that got me on a plane to Abu Dhabi, UAE on my 25th birthday. What a gift.

Stay tuned for part 2…