When I found myself with crippling social anxiety in high school, I used the idea of adventure to help open me up to life and overcome the fears that were stopping me from truly living. My first “adventures” were not what people would think of as “adventures”: for me in my social anxiety, smiling at a stranger was jumping off a cliff. To me, that smile was a “deep and true adventure”.
Indeed, you don’t have to adventure conventionally to be an adventurer: bringing the spirit of adventure into life in all its forms can be a vehicle to propel you towards a deep and wide and rich and full life no matter where you are or what you or doing. Or, as I found out when I explored the deeper roots of my attachment to the idea of adventure, adventure can also be a way to hide from life and its fears and hopes and pains–
Ooh… deep 🙂
Indeed. There is a richness to adventure beyond the stereotype of adventure merely being exotic travel or thrilling sports. And so I use the spirit of adventure to challenge myself to live a deeper and fuller life, even if I’m not off “adventuring” somewhere. As I am deeply inspired by the quintessential adventurers I know who sail the world and visit exotic ports, hop trains, and snowboard and surf some of the best locales in the world. But it is not their adventures so much as the spirit with which they live those adventures which truly inspires me: they go into their adventures so obviously living boldly and courageously and passionately and so open to life and with such appreciation for it. And I truly believe that you can bring this spirit of adventure into “everyday life” and it can help you to live more deeply and fully no matter where you are or what you are doing.
So yeah… once upon a time, I set out on an epic quest to try to live life to the fullest as a high school senior paralyzed with both crippling social anxiety and the overwhelm of all of life’s possibilities. To go through any door seemed like it would just shut all the rest… so I just stood in the hallway of life, frozen in indecision. But then I thought… what if I approached life as an adventure? What if I admitted all possibilities simply by starting to write a list of all these possibilities and discovered what came from that?
I’m still working out what came from that, as it was a lot of adventure and a lot of growth and a lot of epiphanies. That is what this website is all about: I’m trying to make sense of my epic quest. I want to invite you into that. You can witness (and help?) me try to write a book which right now seems overwhelming. And you can also explore my unconventional take on adventure… and discover how my book– and my epic quest– was not so much about adventure as it is conventionally understood, but about using the spirit of adventure to overcome the limitations of fear and learn how to bring the spirit of adventure into life in all its forms in order to live life so that none of it is wasted on me. Indeed, my book is about the human experience and how to truly be alive in this one life we have to live.
I also hope to start an actual Deep and True Adventurer’s Guild of people who connect with my ideas here and what I write… and who want to take the spirit of adventure into life in all its forms. Because, again, the idea of adventure which I’ve applied to my life is not how adventure is commonly understood– simply as traveling or risky sports– but instead, it is about adventure as an approach to life wherever you are and whatever you are doing. As to me, the essence of adventure is about opening oneself up to the experience of life, being present to it and grateful in it, permitting spontaneity and wonder, taking risks and facing fears, and practicing radical self-honesty. Many times we wait until some exotic trip to do this… letting a new endeavor finally open us to life and fill us with wonder. But why reserve that type of deep living for traveling, rather than bringing that approach into every day life so that none of life is wasted on us?
Indeed, life itself is the adventure. Don’t miss it 🙂
“Don’t go out into the world to find adventure… find adventure in yourself and take that out into the world.” — Me, a hopelessly dorky wholesome bohemian stealing ideas from the Transcendental Idealists.
