Wandering Limbs

With just three days left in Australia, i realize my taste of heaven and freedom is coming to an end.Today marks two months over seas to date, which far exceeds any amount of time spent away from home in any consecutive manner. Back in July, a whole seven months ago, i stayed in Nebraska for almost four weeks and to say i was destroyed by the end of my trip would be forgiving. Then, i never could have imagined myself staying in another state (let alone another country) for this long. Surprisingly, i completely avoided crisis this go-around with the exception of a breif sobbing phone call home after the first couple of weeks. At that point, i had familiarized myself with surroundings accepted the cold, harsh reality that nothing would ever be the same. I don't consider that a break down, but rather a coming-to-my-senses... tears aside, it was a pleasent epiphany-- i no longer have doubts about my intentions here in Australia.
Coming home means a lot of things, but nothing is certain. I left hoping to return with an idea of what i wanted to do with my career, schooling, and life in general. Instead, i return knowing for sure not what i want to do, but what i don't want to do... which is nothing specific. One thig i do know is that i'll always be indecisive and some things you can't plan. I discovered a part of myself that i was always scared to look into. I always thought i wasn't adventurous, and that i'd always go the safe route just to make sure i didn't make any mistakes. I realize now that i am the complete opposite, and i always have been. I don't take steps, i plunge into whatever it is that i want to do and the irony of it all is that things like going skydiving only cause minor ripples in the water. I discovered this 'drive' that people compliment me on, and i realize my potential now more than i ever have. Before, it was like i had these arms and legs but i never knew what they did. I always felt disconnected and disjointed but i feel whole for once, i feel like a normal person with abnormal feelings and abnormal ambitions (define normal, Mackenzie). It is a beautiful feeling of self awareness and a level of confidence i don't think i would have ever discovered, had i not left the states for a breif two months. It excites me to know that if this much self-empowerment can take place in a very, very short two months- i have the rest of my life to figure things out, and that's more than enough time. Excuse my cliche, but the day i get back to sweet Texas will be the beginning of the rest of my life. Up until this point, i wasn't living my life. I skimmed by, assuming i knew what i was doing and hoping for the best. Not that i won't continue doing the same thing, i'll just take comfort in knowing that this isn't the first time i'll ruin something and it definately isn't the last. But i think the most important point i'm reaching to make is this: I love messing things up. What's better than getting yourself in the the biggest, messiest, ugliest, tangled web you've ever made and feeling absoloutely stuck and miserable only to get yourself out? That feeling when you realize you made it out alive, and the rest is an easy tumbling down until you hit the next kink in the rope is absoloutely worth making a mistake. Maybe i'm crazy and enjoy sulking in self pity, or maybe i even enjoy the termoil; Or, perhaps i hold a special appreciation for the hardening of life. I know now that no situation is worth 'losing it' over, and no matter what you do about anything- it has an inevitable end.
I ramble on, but i really do hope my readers (family and friends alike) take something out of my travels even though they could not be here with me. If there is anything i could share with the world and hammer into the minds of every single person i know, it's that you should absoloutely learn to be alone and that it's never too late to become your own person. Though it doesn't seem like it, this trip was one of the hardest things i'll ever have to do. Overcoming the fear of being away from the ones you love and every single familiar thing is the only way to test your inner strength and your ability to adapt and cope with starting over. Removing yourself from things you directly link to your identity makes you realize how things really are. You notice things about yourself that you hate and you have no choice but to change, and not for anyone else but for yourself. You put yourself first not because you're selfish, but because you need to survive and do absoloutely anything you can to maintain a sense of being 'grounded'. People don't know that you read Shakespeare, that you like Radiohead, what you went to school for, or even that you got into one of the top graduate schools in the world- they don't care. You are none of those things. You are a human being, no more or less than anyone else. You have the ability to create, inspire, communicate, imagine, and move in one inevitable motion: forward. You have the power to convince anyone in the world that you are a good person, and that you have the capacity to love endlessly because you do; You were created with the ability to form friendships and relate to others. So who are you without your friends, without your family, music, books, and pets? You are a person worth discovering.