The Ride of My Life Podcast

Today, I am organizing my thoughts and preparing to go to talk to someone in the next few days as I am in the process of deciding what I am going to do about purchasing the van.

The actual act of doing this is easy, working through each action step, it gives me tasks to do to take my mind off thoughts and concerns.

Some days it might not seem as though I am excited to do this. I am.

The challenge is walking through my healing journey at the same time, because it is part of this. Going through my emotions at the same time as I do this is natural, emotions will come up.

That is what is going on today.

Sometimes I get too much time to think, and I have explained before in past blog posts that our thoughts cause our emotions, and our emotions cause reactions in our bodies that eventually lead to illness or dis-ease. That is why I suggest the tools I use to release the emotions that aren’t serving me. I’m not saying they will work for everyone, they are just suggestions and have absolutely worked for me.

My growth process at this point is no different than it has always been. Now I have the added dimension of doing something I have wanted to do my whole life but have been afraid to do it.

“Feel the fear and do it anyway.”

Fear is there for a reason, but it doesn’t need to run our lives. I’m ok with this fear I am having. I am actually “talking” to it to find out what it is there to teach me. There are a few fears going on and each one is helping me to understand why it is there for me.

In our society, our fears are there because we have been so conditioned into stress, that the Stress Response is on stuck mode – getting stuck in Fight, Flight, Freeze or Fawn.

Our stress response is there for us to use in momentary situations, it shouldn’t be constantly going on. I’ve explained before about hyper-vigilance, anxiety and worry. That is the stuck response. It actually becomes a “normal” way of life, if we aren’t aware of what is going on and can lead to depression. Most who have been traumatized are not aware once the habit has been set.

I will probably be explaining that at another point, but for now, here is where I am.

I am here to tell you that it can be unset, but it takes work. And there are residual fears that hold on, even after healing through the old stuff. That is what is happening with me now with my plans.

It is actually all good, because I am definitely beyond the hyper-vigilance and anxiety mostly and the worry has pretty much subsided.

What is coming up for me is mostly the fear of the unknown, which I have been challenged with most of my life. So, as I sit with this fear and find out what it is here to teach me, I know deep down that I am taken care of. I know that everything always works out for me, because it does, no matter how small or large it is. And I am grateful.

I want to say that just by connecting with you and talking about this out loud has been really helping me to get out of my head and into my heart. That is the goal of healing. We all have the potential to do that. It just takes a decision… a choice.

And we all have choices. Which one are you going to choose today?

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Perfect timing… I had mentioned that not only is this chronicling the logistics of what is going on with purchasing the van, it is also about where my emotions are going too.

I just watched, actually not finished watching, a movie called Nomadland. It’s very interesting and it chronicles a woman who ended up in a van because her husband died, and she lost her job in a small town that ended up shutting down because where she worked was the main source of income for the whole town. They actually got rid of the zip code. That was pretty sad, but things like that happen all over this country, more than most of us know.

It’s a really good movie, but the beginning takes place in the dead of winter, with snow, in Nevada. Yeah, that’s not happening. I plan on Snow birding my way around. I don’t do snow, if I can help it. I don’t mind visiting up there to see what it’s about in the summer, but not that.

Anyway, this share is about what I am mostly feeling today. I knew this would eventually come up, especially at the beginning of this process.

Yes, parts of the movie put fear in me about the unknown.

Things went wrong and the main character showed her emotions of frustration, sadness and fear very well. She did receive assistance at every turn, though, from the people out there.

My issue, since I empathically feel others’ emotions sometimes, is that I may have picked up on her stuff, and mixed it with my feelings, even though it’s just a movie. I don’t know the answer right now in this moment, but I do know that all will be revealed.

It gave me some time to sit with it.

What I know is that I am not giving up on this lifelong dream I’ve had since I was young. I love to travel, and I love to see what’s out there. I have done this before in a Class A Motorhome and I used to go camping a lot, so I get the gist of the possibilities and probabilities.

I know I can do this, and I also know there will be times like this where I feel scared. I’m ok with that because what I do know is that I am meant to do this for a while, and I am good with that.

Sure, there will be things that come up in all of this and of course it’s scary. I am just to the point in my life where I don’t want to sit and wonder what could have been and go to my grave that way. This is big and with all the of support I have been getting, I can do this!

The interesting thing is that I always appreciate hearing about people, who when they die, they were at least doing something they loved doing. We will all eventually die, and I am slowly getting into the head space where it is ok for me to do something I love.

Throughout my life I have feared death. A lot of us do. What I did learn a while ago is the reason I feared death so much was because I also feared life. I have been hiding and protecting myself for a long time.

I am not doing that anymore. I have a lot of life to live, and I choose to take advantage of that to the best of my ability.

Yes… I’m scared. And yes… this is happening.

Thank you for joining me on The Ride of My Life!

The Ride of My Life Blog is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

I’m on a roll. Here I am already on Day 3 and so much is happening. I mentioned a while ago that people and situations start to be removed from our lives when we are ready to move forward. This is not easy for someone like me who has had attachment and abandonment issues throughout my life.

Clearly, I am able to handle it, though because that is exactly what I am doing. Yesterday, as soon as I put up my Blog (on Substack) and Vlog (on YouTube) and posted on FB about what was going on, it seemed as though the Universe turned on me.

My ego mind then went right into tangent mode and I literally lost it.

Interestingly, I went through that for about 3 minutes and then realized, “Hmm, maybe this is more like a “test” in my PhD program of life.

Me: Ok, I’m willing to post this and put myself out there, here I go.

Universe:

Me: “No! Everything is hitting me at the same time! I don’t know what to do about getting a loan! I’ve done this a million times in my life and feel like I am incompetent! What is happening? And now, I have to go ship something in the middle of all this.

Universe:

Me: “I knew it! I should have never posted that soon. What was I thinking? Now I feel like a fraud and a complete moron.” (Lots of tears follow.)

Universe:

Me: (After a breath or two or three) “Wait a minute, maybe the Universe is testing me to see if I truly mean what I am saying about my next step.”

Universe: “Ok, you’re starting to listen and get it.”

Me: (After another breath or two.) Thought: I’m watching things slowly but surely be released from me. The people and situations that no longer serve me. This is hugely scary for me, but I am starting to see it is part of this process and from a different perspective now.

Universe: “Keep going.”

Me: “Ok, I see what’s happening. I get to sit with this and allow these feelings of fear to move through me and it really is nauseating. I feel like I’m going to throw up.”

Universe: “Good, now you’re on the right path.”

What the hell? All of this was going on yesterday and small things started to fall into place and make sense and the big thing with loss became clear as to what was happening. This is deep stuff and on one hand I know I can handle it and on the other I just want to crawl under my covers and hide.

I’m not crawling under my covers and I am not going to hide anymore.

Yesterday, friends reached out to me from my post and were so supportive and loving, telling me they knew I could do this and also how brave I am. One person even said, “You got guts lady. I’m proud of you for your courage.”

That actually floored me. I have been told similar things throughout my life, but this desire is bigger than the other things I was told those things for.

Yes! I am brave and courageous. Yes! I got guts! And yes! I am doing this.

I have nothing to lose and everything to gain and I have been through many trials in my life that were probably harder than this, so I am set up to do this.

So, thank you for being here on The Ride of My Life and I am grateful to you all.

The Ride of My Life Blog is a reader-supported publication. To receive new posts and support my work, consider becoming a free or paid subscriber.

Well, I’m finding that as I am learning this new thing of living in a van, the basics of getting ready are already challenging me. Learning curves have always caused anxiety, but for something this is big? Well, you can imagine.

So, keeping my mind as “off of it” as possible, I am also continuing to work on decluttering and getting rid of pretty much everything I own. This part isn’t particularly hard for me as I have been doing that for many years. The hard part is selling online. Some posts, everything goes at once, some, all I get are crickets. That is quite a challenge in itself.

I am actually on the last part of this project besides the selling which is digitizing pictures and paperwork. That is a lot and takes a long time. Learning patience. I have pictures for both my kids, my life, my father, my mother and my grandparents. So many printed pictures from back in the day. If I don’t lose my mind from that, it will be a miracle.

Anyway, as I do that, I am also preparing to sell or trade in my leased vehicle and get the van. There is so much to consider, it’s not that simple. You really have to set things up in so many areas. The first being insurance. So that is what I am working on now. That and a physical and mailing address to use. Freedom is not so free when you realize that you have to figure these things out. It can be done; people are doing it.

I’ve been watching videos and trying to learn how to do all of this. My thing is that I need to talk to someone who is or has done this so I can talk my way through to decisions and understanding what I am doing. I get lost in my head with all of the information when I can’t talk it out.

If anyone reading this or seeing me out there talking about this has done this, please contact me, I could definitely use some guidance and be able to bounce questions.

Ok, now off to looking into selling and buying my next vehicle!

Stay in touch with me on The Ride of My Life! Thanks!

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