My New Project 365: 365 Handstands

On February 28th, 2014 I began a little project to do a handstand every day for a year. I'm up to 152 days now, and I thought it was about time to write a blog about why I decided to embark on this little journey! 

 If you have floated around on this blog at all (or are lucky enough to get it emailed to you every time I post!) then you know that this is not my first 365 project.  In 2012 I took a picture every day for an entire year (posting them all here) and it was an absolute blast, so for me this is kind of a new twist on an old favorite. That being said, here are the reasons I chose to pick up another 365 project and in particular, 365 handstands.

(1) Making Every Day Count:  I think the great thing about having one small (fun) thing to do every day is that it really forces you to be mindful each and every day of not letting the time slip through your fingers. So often we rush through life from one day to the next - they string together, day in and day out we have routine and obligations. Mondays might be particularly icky and Fridays especially freeing, but it is so easy to let the days just float on by. Giving myself one fun thing that I do every single day helps me to capture the day just the tiniest bit for myself.  It helps me to mark the passage of time in a positive way and to make sure that I don't let even one day fall through the cracks. 

(2) A Moment of Freedom:  For me, handstands are freedom. There is just something so fun about being on my hands, I can't get enough of it. As adults, we spend too much time being 'grown ups' and not enough time letting go.  Standing on my feet or sitting on my butt are often associated with obligations: work, chores, finances... (and of course sometimes candy crush!) But being on my hands is always for me. I'm not doing anything for anyone else when I'm on my hands - I'm letting go and giving myself some play time, and I LOVE that 365 handstands has given me an excuse to play a little bit every single day.

(3) An Atmosphere of Growth:  Handstands are not the end-all-be-all. As my yoga teachers often remind us, it's not going to get me into heaven, it's not going to help me help someone in need, beyond my mat it's really just a stupid human trick. But what makes it so fun and I think why it is such a great focus for so many yogis, is that it represents a challenge.  A mountain to climb.  According to the book "The Happiness Project" one of the biggest keys to happiness is to exist in an atmosphere of growth. Working on my handstands has been a super awesome and fun way to constantly be growing in a tangible way.  When I started, I could comfortably kick up into a handstand leaning on the wall, and that was it. Only 8 days into my project I experienced my first 'hang time' without touching the wall! Now I can hold it for up to 5 seconds in the middle of a room.  Today I did a tuck handstand for the first time ever and last week I did a straddle handstand for the first time ever, and it was exciting!! Working on handstands in particular (with so many variations and so many fun ways to get into and out of the pose) gives me opportunities on a weekly, sometimes daily basis, to rejoice in small victories.  And don't we all need a little more rejoicing in our daily lives?! I can't wait to see where I'll be in another 150 days!

(4) Chronicling a Journey:  Every day I do a handstand. Most days its just a couple of minutes after my regular yoga practice. Some days I spend 5 or 10 minutes working on it, lots of days I really have no time to work on it and I just pop up, snap a picture, and go about my business.  The point is that I'm not dedicating my life to this handstand business, in any given week I'm dedicating about ~7 - 28 minutes total on my handstand. But that little amount has caused me to grow leaps and bounds in my practice in just 5 months.  It is a constant reminder that in all areas in life I do not need to master anything NOW - nothing is mastered in a day.  But small, consistent steps in the direction that I am going will add up to huge results in the long run.  Doing a handstand every day has been a metaphor for showing me that discipline and consistency are the most important things I need to get anywhere in life. Not huge chunks of uninterrupted time (although those help sometimes too!) but really looking at where I want to go and making an effort to consistently take small steps in that direction will get me there. And what a great thing that is to teach yourself.

(5) An Artistic Outlet:  Taking a picture a day of all of my handstands has given me a reason to look at the world around me again (just like with my first Project 365) looking for new and fun places to do my handstand, or new angles from which to take the picture, new photo editing apps on my phone, and new shapes with my body. It is just a really fun way to exercise the left side of my brain every day - even if it's only to create an InstaGram image!

So there you have it... the reasons I do a handstand every day.  Perhaps posting pictures of myself every day on InstaGram is a little narcissistic and self indulgent... yes perhaps (but can't that argument be made for most social media activity in general!?).  And perhaps I am perpetuating some glorification of handstands instead of the ideal that all asanas are created equal or perverting my practice by making it about outward appearance of the asanas instead of the inner journey they take us on... Yes an argument can be made for all of those things.  But this is not my intent. I have no control over how other people will interpret my handstand photos, but isn't that just a fact of life. None of us have any control over how our actions or words will be interpreted. All we can do is be honest about what we put out there and stay true to ourselves.  

All I can say is that I am having a blast playing on my hands, and I intend to continue to do it for as long as I can!!

 

If you want to follow my handstand journey, find me on InstaGram @razzelberry!!



 

Good Morning World!

Well I'll be the first one to say it, it's been way too long since I've posted a blog. I can hardly believe it... 5 months! It's ridiculous! Not only have I not written, I haven't even loaded any new pictures onto my computer since Halloween!!

(I was roadkill, aka a dead cat!)

A lot of this has to do with the fact that it was in October that I finally gained employment and have been completely and utterly exhausted for the last four months (P90X has also had something to do with that). But coping with full-time employment is really only half of the story.

What it really boils down to is that after coming back from basically two years of gallivanting around the world, it has been really hard for me to find anything worth writing about here at home. Of course I do fun things here and there, but nothing really compares to the thrill and excitement of discovering something new in a foreign land.

That being said, I've made my mind up. I have spent an entire year trying to figure out how to exist back at home, trying to be content with being in one place and living a "normal" life, and trying to figure out what the hell it is that I want out of life. Enough is enough. It's time to start seeing my life here at home through new and fresh eyes. Not only is it time to do something blog-worthy, it's time to THINK something blog-worthy! For the love of God, it is time to stop living like a 9-5 zombie and find some light in the world again.

So there you have it. This is my promise to myself. I will start blogging again! Today is a new day.

The American Dream

We've all heard talk about the death of the American Dream; that the American Dream is no longer possible to achieve here in America. I can't speak on the reality of the rags-to-riches stories or the problems with our class mobility.... but I can assure you that the American Dream is alive and well.  There are millions of people all over the world hoping that one day they'll get that all powerful green card and be allowed to immigrate to the US.

Everyone has a different reason for wanting a green card; a better chance for their children, freedom from oppression, a chance at a new start.... Even in Taiwan, an advanced and politically free country with great opportunities for entrepreneurs, it seems like everyone is working on getting a green card. (Although they view it more as insurance so that they have a means of escape should China ever attack Taiwan).


But the point isn't why people want to come to America. The point is that everywhere in the world are people just waiting and praying for a chance to come here.

I've always loved my country and had a strong sense of national pride, but it took me leaving for 15 months to really appreciate everything we've got here in America. Even so, I still found myself wondering why. Why would some people risk everything they've got - give up everything they know - for a chance to live here in America? 

As soon as I arrived at my parents house, it hit me. This is why people come to America:

For a chance at owning their own plot of land, their own sanctuary from the craziness of the world. For a yard, and a picket fence, and 2.5 kids, and a dog. For a chance to get away from the smog and noise and people... for a chance at freedom and the pursuit of happiness.

It's funny though. I never thought much of American suburbia, never had too high of an opinion of it, until I really lived in the alternative. The American suburbs are great! Clean air, good schools, low traffic, low crime rate, they're quiet and convenient, and every where you look birds are singing and flowers are blooming... all around, the suburbs are just a great place to raise a family!

What I came home to is why people come to America. My father is a first generation American, his father came here from Germany as a young man. And here my parents are: with three kids, two cars, and a house. Their own land and the freedom to do (almost) anything they please with it. This is why America is a great country. 

Now I'm not delusional, and I know we've got a lot of problems here in the USA - racial inequality, an increasing gap between the rich and poor, trouble with our schools and prisons, not to mention our screwed up foreign policy.  I also know that it's not the only (or the best) place in the world where the "American Dream" is possible to achieve, but the fact remains that anything is possible here. This is a great country. I am proud to be an American, and it is good to be back!

A shot of my home town of Pittsburgh from atop Mt. Washington

Americans are Fat! and other observations...

When Nick and I were living in Taiwan, I used to read a lot of other people's Taiwan blogs. At the time, I noticed that lots of bloggers kind of just dropped off the face of the earth once they returned home. I thought this was peculiar. As a reader, I was interested in how they felt upon returning, what surprised them, what wisdom they'd gained by looking back at it all... I wondered to myself how they could just abandon their blog and all their readers without even saying goodbye???

Then I came home. And here I am having not written a blog in 10 days. What do I have to say for myself?

Over the last week, I've vacillated between chastising myself for being lazy and reminding myself that after 15 months out of the country, I have every right to take a week or two to myself. I have a right to be lazy for a little while. I'm not sure if I really buy that excuse, but for now I'm using it as a way to rationalize sitting on my butt for a while and avoiding the real world.

But since I've been home, I have done some pretty cool things, noticed things I'd never noticed before, and had a couple revelations.

One of the biggest problems I've had in adjusting back to life in the US has to do with toilet paper. The plumbing in SE Asia is not really equipped to properly deal with the flushing of toilet paper. As a result, over the last 4 months, I became used to throwing my toilet paper into a waste bin next to the toilet.

It turned out to be a tough habit to kick. For the entire first week I was home, I was regularly not flushing my toilet paper. Every so often, I would remember to flush it and then marvel at the efficiency with which our plumbing whisks it all away here in America. Even so, 5 days after arrival, I found myself carrying my toilet paper around looking for a trash can to avoid clogging the toilet. It literally took me a full 7 days to get accustomed to the novelty of just tossing it in the bowl.

Over the last 10 days, in between bouts of laziness, I've gone to the Pittsburgh Pirates season opener, gone to the recording studio with my dad, gotten my hair done, gotten a pedicure, gone shopping, and met several friends for lunch.   

Enjoying America's favourite pass time on our first day back in the USA

me at the recording studio with my daddy

My time spent out an about has lead to my biggest realization since I came back to the US: Americans are BIG! We're huge. Seriously.

Even the people that are not fat by any estimation are big when compared with people in Southeast Asia; we're taller, wider, thicker... we're just bigger all around. I was amazed just noticing chest-size alone! No one in Asia has boobs like American girls do. (Is it all the steroids that ends up in our beef and dairy products???) We've got regular sized Americans who are much bigger than anyone in SE Asia, and then we've got the bigger Americans that are absolutely super-sized when compared with people in Asia.

I tell you, it's certainly opened my eyes to this obesity problem we have in America. And it's also opened my eyes to the root cause of it: our food is HUGE as well!

Massive chicken salad I got in Pittsburgh including french fries, a pile of cheese, and a tub of ranch dressing

I'm finding it very difficult to eat healthy now that I'm back. Our portion sizes are completely out of touch with the amount of food someone actually needs to sustain life. Aside from that, our meals are far from balanced. One day this week, I found myself eating meals that consisted of 90% carbohydrates for the entire day! It's almost impossible to eat like that in Asia. I couldn't even if I wanted to!

This says nothing of all of the processed food, high fructose corn syrup, and fast food we've got available here. I don't know what has happened to our country, but it is sad that the cheapest and easiest food is the high calorie, processed food. In Asia, it is easy and cheap to eat healthy and fresh. And this is our problem. 

The chicken sandwich my friend ordered had 2 huge patties!! who needs two patties on a chicken sandwich!??

And so here I am, trying not to gain all the weight back that I lost while I was gone (which eventually will require me to get off my ass and do something productive with myself). And trying to figure out how to eat healthily in a place that makes it so difficult to do so!

I'm Home!

Well, here I am! After over 24 hours of travel, Nick and I have finally made it home! I can't believe it!

And what an emotional 24 hours it was. Nick and I both knew we were in for a bit of a roller coaster (emotionally speaking) when we found ourselves a bit too moved by the in-flight showing of Sandra Bullock's movie The Blind Side.

Neither of us actually kissed the ground when we arrived on American soil, but we both wanted to. I got a little choked up on the jet way, but kept my composure and hummed patriotic songs all the way from the gate through immigration and then through customs - the Star Spangled Banner, You're a Grand Ole' Flag, Proud to Be and American, My Country Tis of Thee....

The first thing I did once we cleared customs was to drink water from a water fountain (something I haven't been able to do for over a year!) Then, I called my parents collect from O'Hare airport (mostly just because I could!) and let them know I was back in the good ole' USA. After a short conversation, I proceeded to cry on Nick's shoulders for several minutes - tears of joy - because we were finally HOME!

Except that we still had a 3 hour lay-over plus a 60 minute wait on the tarmac for some maintenance. We arrived just after 8pm, an hour late. In anticipation of seeing my parents for the first time in 15 months, I shed some tears on the tram connecting the gates with baggage claim. Then, a couple minutes later when I actually saw my parents, I started to cry again!

But after that, it was all out of my system and we collected our bags and headed home to my first home-cooked meal in many many months - lasagna, pumpkin pie, and a 6-pack of Bud Light for Nick!

This morning, after only 6 hours of sleep, Nick and I awoke bright and early to a chorus of birds chirping outside of my parents' house. At first we both thought it was a recording being broadcasted over a PA system, or maybe some song birds hung in cages outside the window.

But it didn't take us long to realize that it wasn't a recording, but it was actually NATURE! We woke up to the sounds of NATURE! and beyond the chirping birds was blissful, American silence.

I still have another post about Singapore and then.... I'm not really sure what will happen to my blog, but I'm not quite ready to think about the future past my first day home yet. So all I have to say for now is It's good to be home!!!

48 hours

Wow... here we are. In 48 hours I'll already be on an airplane on my way home, after 15 months. So how do I feel??


Well, to be honest, I'm not really sure. Every time I think about going home, I have a different reaction; sometimes I get butterflies in my stomach, sometimes a lump in my throat. Sometimes I'm really excited and sometimes I'm depressed and disappointed.

Until recently, I didn't even realize that it has been an entire 15 months since I was last home. 15 months is a long time! A lot has happened over the last 15 months and I'm not sure I can even appreciate it fully until I finally get home and process it all; get some perspective.

I have to admit though, that as excited as I am to finally go home and return to normalcy, a big part of me is really really sad that it's over. It's hard for me not to feel like, "this is it." It's over. I'll never do something like this again. I'll never have 4 months with absolutely no obligations, no place to be, nothing I HAVE to do - just 4 months to exist; to learn new things, see new places, to live life and to experience it in any way I choose. And that really depresses me.

But I have to just keep reminding myself that it doesn't have to be like that. I don't have to go home and get a job and get married and get a mortgage and have kids.............. I don't have to do anything. I think more than anything else, this trip has taught me that.

Life is full of choices - the world is my oyster.

I hope that I get the chance to do something like this again, but if I don't, it will be because I chose to do something else with my life. Something else that makes me feel  happy and fulfilled.

But I do hope that I resist the urge to settle too much into normalcy. One of the things that I love about travelling is that it gets you out of familiar surroundings and forces you to think. You constantly have to think about things that you never have to think about in your normal life:

Where am I going to sleep? How to I eat this? How do I get from point A to B? What the hell is that? What should I do today? (with more options than ever possible at home). What is this person trying to communicate to me? How do I communicate? How do I use this toilet??

All of this thinking leads to lots more thinking and before you know it you just spent 15 months thinking; looking at things from a different perspective, learning about other world views, learning about your own world view... just thinking and learning and thinking some more. I never even realized how much of my life was spent not thinking, until I left everything that I knew and tried to survive in a completely foreign place.
Just thinking about all the thinking I've done is making my brain tired!

In the first two months of our travel alone, I read 13 books! Never before did I have this much time to spend on enlightenment. It was wonderful.

So, when I think about going home, I have to admit that a part of me is very depressed about the whole thing. But with home being only 48 hours away, a larger part of me is excited beyond words.

Home has a really nice ring to it right now.

A Bit About Perspective

If there's one thing I've learned from this trip, it is how subjective we are as people.

One thing that is interesting about traveling is that it really puts you on an emotional roller coaster. Any emotion that you might feel about a normal situation is often exacerbated while you are traveling. When you're happy, you're really happy and when your irritable, your really irritable. In general even the most level-headed person will have to deal with great mood swings and bouts of emotional instability during any long-term travel. It just comes with the territory.


Because our emotions tend to be so exaggerated while on the road, it lends itself to exposing things in human nature that are typically subtle and imperceptible - like the subjectivity of personal experiences.


Over the last three months, Nick and I have spent lots of time talking to other travelers. We've exchanged countless travel stories and lots of advice, and it never ceases to amaze me how different everyone's experiences and opinions are.


We can talk to five different people about the exact same place and hear five completely different stories and opinions. Some people will tell you that a Thai person will NEVER try to rip you off and others will tell you that they felt like the Thais were ripping them off every time they turned around. Some people find Vietnam to be fantastic and magical and others find their travel here to be merely mediocre. Many people have written online that they were extremely disappointed in the Mekong Delta and I found it absolutely fabulous and everything I was hoping for.


So what is the reason for such vast discrepancies? We're all over here doing the same thing. Virtually every backpacker in Southeast Asia is hitting the same cities, going on very similar tours, and hanging out at the same places... so how can all of our experiences be so vastly different?


What I've learned is that each individual’s perception of a country, a city, a people, has much more to do with that individual and what's going on in their life at the moment than it does with where they are or what they're experiencing out in the world.


Things that factor into a persons' perception of a particular place include:

• How were you feeling that day? (were you sick or tired?)
• Did you get a good night's sleep last night (or were there roosters crowing and dogs howling all night?)
• Where are you in your trip - beginning, middle, end
• How are you feeling about your trip? (I don't have enough time... I'm ready to go home...)
• What were your expectations (often they were unreasonable to begin with or they were so low that you were plesantly surprised)

All of these things and more factor into how we perceive and experience things every day - not just when we're traveling. I always believed (thanks to my parents) that a positive outlook is important in life. I have always known that in any situation you can choose to look at things with the glass half full or half empty. But until I spent this much time out of the US I never realized how much our mental state really does effect our perception of life.

Can any two people ever have the exact same experience? I don't really believe so. Even Nick and I, who have been together day in and day out for over a year, are having our own independent experiences. Especially since we left Taiwan, we have done everything together. But if you ask us about our experiences you will probably hear very different stories. Sure the major points will be the same, but we focus on different things, we notice different things, we have our own independent swings in emotion, our previous expectations were different from each other’s and our previous travel experience was different...


If anything, it has reinforced my belief that a positive attitude in life is of utmost importance. But I think it has also taught me to look beyond myself and realize that my point of view is not the only point of view. It's not just about respecting other people's opinions, it's about respecting other people's perceptions of the world.


And, when taking advice from other travelers, it's important to remember that just because they hated a particular place, doesn't mean you will. Maybe they just had some bad dumplings that day.

A Time Out

So here we are, ½ way through my journey. Well, I guess that depends on which journey we’re talking about. If we look at the bigger picture, I hit my half-way point back in August or September. But if we’re only talking about the 4-month backpacking trip I’m currently on, then here I am – half way done.

So, how does it feel to be half way through my trip? Well it’s a bit surreal. It seems like it has gone by so quickly, but if I think about all of the places we’ve been and things we’ve done… then I realize how much there is yet to come. 2 more countries, 2 more months.

And what have I learned so far? Over the last year I’ve learned that you have to live your life for yourself and only yourself. That’s not to say that you need to live selfishly, it just means that you are the only judge that matters in your own life. No matter what you do or where you go or what you accomplish, someone will always be better than you or have done something you didn’t or couldn’t. If I go to 80 countries in my life, there will always be people who’ve gone to 81 or more. If I make $1,000,000 there will always be people making more. But if I make $1,000,000 and go to 81 countries and I’m not happy, then what’s the point?

Ever since I started going abroad, I’ve always felt a need to compare myself with other people who’ve traveled – and it always leaves me feeling unsatisfied or inferior. But I have realized that everyone is just following their own path and that doesn’t make their path better or worse than the path that I’m on. Life is not a competition. Whether you live your whole life in the town you grew up in, spend life as a nomad, or do something in between, we can’t judge ourselves by comparing our lives with other people’s. No one is better or worse, we’re just different.

I still find myself getting jealous when we bump into someone whose doing 7 or 9 months of travelling – compared to our 4, but it just doesn’t matter what other people are doing. It just doesn’t. What matters is that I’m happy doing what I’m doing. And I am. I’m so happy.

At this point I thought that I would be sad that I’m ½ way through… I’m going home soon! But I’m not sad at all. I’m excited. I have no idea what I’m going to do when I get back to the States. In some ways, my future after returning to the US is more uncertain than the next two months of travelling. And I’m excited for that next challenge... wherever it might take me. (Unemployment maybe??)

When I left for my big trip abroad, I was hoping for an epiphany. I didn’t know what I wanted to do with my life and I hoped that while I was out of the country lightening would strike and I would find my place in the world. But of course, that didn’t happen. I’m no closer to knowing what I want to do than I was when I left. But I’m ok with that. If I just keep doing what I think is best for myself, I will eventually find my way. What do they say? Luck is when opportunity meets with preparedness (or something like that.) Well as long as I’m working toward a better me, then I’m not worried about the future.

What else have I learned? Well there’s a HUGE difference between travelling through a place and living in a place. I’m not sure what I was expecting when we left Taiwan and started on this backpacking trip, but for the first three weeks or so, I found myself somewhat unsettled. We were seeing all these awesome places and doing awesome things, but it was never enough for me. I felt like we should be having some deep spiritual experience or really interacting with these new cultures in a way that just isn’t possible when you’re in any given place for only a couple of days.

Backpacking is basically just being a “budget tourist.” Plain and simple. Sure we’re having awesome experiences and we’re learning a lot about the world, but just because I have a backpack on my back doesn’t mean that I’ll spend the next 4 months making deep connections with “locals,” having spiritual revelations and personal epiphanies. And who has the energy for that anyway!

I’m certainly not going “where no man has gone before” heck, I’m hardly on the “road less traveled” but that doesn’t make it any less of a challenge or adventure. I am on my own journey – discovering the world for myself. And I couldn’t be happier.