Okay. So… I have a story to tell. I am here to record a story.

I just want to paint a picture of what’s going on around me. I’m sitting on the comfiest couch. Pillowy, cushiony, in the middle of a room that is surrounded by glass, and I have a sunset playing out before me.

There’s a mountain, and the sun has just gone past the point where it can burn your retinas… and now I can look at it because the bright rays of sunlight are coming from beyond the mountain. And before that, there’s all sorts of buildings splayed all over the place. And right in front of that, there’s a big, huge park. It’s like Central Park. It’s actually bigger, apparently, than Central Park.

It’s called Chapultepec (park), which means grasshopper (park). And in that park there’s a castle. For real? For real! There’s a huge fucking castle! And I live on the 13th floor… I do not know how I became so blessed as to have this available to me, but it’s just stunning. Stunning! Please find pictures I’ll post online.

But yeah, I’m sitting here on the couch watching this before me. The beautiful greens, the sunset, the light and this castle just right at my eye level, sitting on top of a big green mound of trees. And then there’s a cityscape right behind it. It’s such a beautiful little landscape of all sorts of different urban motifs.

Okay, that was a tangent, but this is where I’m at. Maybe that’s where I can start, is this is literally where I’m at. I’m sitting in Mexico City, it is January 5th, 2024, and I’m writing in my journal because I have an adventure to head on that has just suddenly appeared. This just struck me, it caught me by surprise that this trip needs to happen.

So… I arrived in Mexico City in November, and normally you get an 180 days when you come through the border here. It’s just standard. And apparently those rules changed a couple months ago, and now it’s to the discretion of the immigrant… immigrant? That’s wrong. Immigration! They’re actually not immigrants… immigration is definitely somebody from the local government.

Anyway! So I went and looked at my stamp, I assumed, which is the ‘no-no’ here – when you’re a digital nomad, don’t assume that your stamp is going to be what you think it’s going to be! Because I’ve learned this lesson… I say learned, yet apparently I’m going through it again! You gotta look at your stamp to be sure how long you’re allowed to be in the fucking country… because if you’re not allowed to be there… then you gotta go!

And that’s what happened… I ended up finding out that I had a 60 day stamp. Guess what? I have to leave the country on the 12th. Today is the fourth. So that’s sudden. And if I can be perfectly honest, financially, this is definitely not the time for this to happen. I absolutely adore adventures. I am willing and able. Let’s do it! But yeah, this just caught me by surprise in big ways, and uncertainty like that, especially when there’s financial fear… I absolutely have fear connected to finances… it just hits hard. I get panic, anxiety, this looming feeling of like, oh, you fucked up! You did something wrong, and now you’re going to fucking pay for it! And it’s going to suck. You’re fucked. That’s essentially how my brain speaks to me.

My brain likes to let me know all the shit that I fucked up and make me pay for it. I’ve come to learn that that’s shame and guilt. I’m trying to notice these patterns at this stage in my healing journey and just re-programing all the shit that goes on in my head.

So I’ve been navigating my way through those feelings of anxiety. I actually have tools now, which is incredible! And I have this sense of awareness that allows me to notice these things, now. Before, I was very much on autopilot and the anxiety was so ingrained in how I lived. It was all I knew. It was just all part of the experience. You know, you’re just so wrapped up in everything that’s happening all the time, and you’re just pushing forward in survival mode. You just gotta get through things.

I feel so removed from that at this stage. I am noticing a difference. I can now take a beat and recognize, oh, I’m feeling anxiety. There’s something going on with my nervous system right now. It’s not me. I am not this anxiety. I am not this fear. There is something at the root of this, and I am removed enough from it that I can respond instead of impulsively reacting right or just being stuck in it.

And so, it’s been so beautiful witnessing myself at this stage where I really am catching myself in these moments and going, whoa, whoa, whoa, wait! It’s okay. We can breathe, we can redirect, we can ground and center and come back to the moment and recognize that everything’s okay. It is not the end of the world. Everything is figureoutable. I have faith, I trust in the process. I am in flow with what is. Let’s just be with this. Let’s just call it what it is. Fear and anxiety and distrust. And we can work with that. Right. We can. We can work with that.

And now, it’s so funny… I woke up this morning feeling bright as a shining light. So energized and positive. I don’t think I’ve been in a mood like this for a while. It was really noticeable. I was very playful and sing-songy and bouncing around… very high energy. When I woke up this morning and I thought, wow, this is so great! I’m going on adventure and everything is figureoutable!

I know that I will be challenged. This is this type of travel I have done a lot over the last five years, and therefore I know that it is extremely challenging for me. There is a part of me that’s like, why the fuck do you have this lifestyle? Like, this is the most dysregulating lifestyle for me. As somebody who is living with trauma, and a dysregulated nervous system that gets tripped up and triggered so easily, and everything is amplified and my senses are totally raw and everything’s intense… it’s just a time in my life where I am very open, I’m more open than I have ever been, and there’s so much coming in and there’s a lot to process.

But also… I have tools and I have awareness. And so, it feels like this adventure is upon me because it will be a test. This is where I’ve landed in 2024. I have landed in this new place of awareness and this ability to practice being in flow with what is, and coming back to love and light and positivity and moving away from fear and redirecting from programming.

I recognize that that is where I’m at in my story. I have this gift of being able to see and move through things now… and now it’s time to practice. Now it’s time to practice being in flow.