As I sit in the car next to my Finnish friend aka Window Girl, the rain pouring down while the wheels spin our way to Delhi, I think about my time in Rishikesh over the last four months.
During our ride, my friend asked me why I had come to this particular city, to Rishikesh. I had to dig in my memory banks to answer her question.
To be honest, I came on a whim because I needed a place to go after leaving Pune and before heading to Dharamshala, which would have been my final stop in India before leaving the country. That last part clearly didn’t go as planned and I am forever grateful for that fact.
Why I came to India though is a much easier answer yet was a far greater challenge.
There comes a point in your life when you are presented with the choice you’ve been running from — and you know it.
It’s what I call the Leap of Faith.
For me India was that leap, the biggest I have yet to take, one in which I was effectively saying that I’m in with both feet, committing to this journey, to this life, to who I am now in this moment.
I knew what coming here would ask of me and what it would mean going forward.
No turning back.
No plan B.
No safety net.
It’s this. 100%. Until the fucking end.
Up to that point, I had coasted through too much of my life, piling moment on top of moment as my life clock continued to tick, using well-intentioned distractions and logic-filled reasons to fuel my hesitation.
And then I found myself on the edge of the cliff with only one choice before me. Stand there forever or make the leap.
I chose to make the leap.
Looking back I can tell you one thing. It’s not fear of the unknown that causes you to hesitate. It’s fear of what you know to be true.
You know you have to trust in yourself and believe in the greater universe that as you dive into the blackened abyss, you will be caught on the other side and land squarely on your own two feet.
Petrifying, I know.
But there are two truths that I can share. One good. One bad.
The good news is that I’m nothing special. Anyone can take the leap.
The bad news? You have to do it yourself. No one can do it for you.
But doing this led me along the unexpected and unpredictable journey that has been India. I can honestly say that in all my travels, no place has captured my heart so. I’ve joked often that I may be white on the outside, but I am brown on the inside. I believe there is more truth to this than not.
And although I am still dealing with some of the same bullshit in my head that tells me how things are supposed to be, some of the same fears inside of things that may never come, I am not the same version of myself that I was six months ago. I hope I can say the same thing in the months that follow.
My friend says India offers the full circle of life’s experience.
You can find parts of it in other places in the world, but India has it all. I have to agree.
In the past four months, I have lived lifetimes of myself through these experiences. From being isolated and focused in my Peepal Tree home to finding my quarantine family at Narayana Palace where drinking whiskey, playing pool and saying “fuck you” translates to “I love you and I have your back 💯 no matter what happens in this world and in this life.”
So as I leave Rishikesh to travel to new and unexplored places in India, I once again have that familiar mix of bittersweet emotions, oscillating between the sadness of leaving my community and newfound family to the excitement of traveling once again and following my heart forward, all the while holding hope squarely in the center of my chest.
I also carry with me a new feeling — the trust that no matter what happens next, I won’t do it alone.
Here’s to Chapter 2.
❤️ 🥃