Otres Beach Paradise & Lessons Learned in Traveling Solo
It’s hard not to feel blissful and filled with inner peace and wisdom when sitting by this gorgeous beach, enjoying a shaded breeze, listening to the sounds of water lapping the sand and music on the restaurant radio, dragon fruit smoothie in hand.
I’ve learned a few things on this trip, and specifically in the past few days, that I hope I can carry with me back to New York in 10 days.
1. If you don’t like something, change it.
I was unhappy at my job and in my stagnant New York life, so I hopped on a plane and have experienced the most happiness, peace, and even joy in the last three months that I have felt in a long time. More concretely, last night I stayed at the Big Easy hostel in Sihanoukville. I loved the friendly owner, liked the big bar out front with its awesome tunes and affordable, tasty, bbq pulled pork, and I appreciated the clean, air conditioned dorm. However, rooming with 16 people in a party beach town leads to drunk dudes puking all night and trying to sleep in the wrong beds. Even without that, the beach scene near the hostel was not my vibe. Being easy going, I could have stuck it out, it wasn’t THAT bad. But instead, I packed my too-many bags and got in a Tuk Tuk to the much nicer Otres beach and booked myself a private room at a social hostel also with a bar/restaurant. While waiting for check in, I indulged in an amazing seafood brunch at Moorea and got the chance to mellow out. After finally seeing my $12 room at Wish You Were Here though, I immediately knew it was way too basic for me, and after my Gecko nemesis fiasco at Hariharalaya I decided that even though the heart and soul of the place was amazing, I had to go. I moved next door to a soulless but slightly more civilized room with private bathroom for $15. I made a great decision. Rather than complaining about something, find a solution, and follow through as soon as possible. Be decicive, and don’t be afraid to change a decision if it’s not working out for you.
2. Age ain’t nothin’ but a number.
I’ve met so many people on this trip and have rarely if ever been able to accurately surmise their ages. I’ve met so many 30 year olds that my perception of what 30 is no longer exists. I’ve met incredibly mature and wise 18 year olds and I’ve met 40-somethings who get wasted every night and act like obnoxious idiots and I’ve met 70-somethings who are loving every minute of their exotic adventure and whose stamina put me to shame. People pass through phases and circumstances and relationships in remarkably unique ways, and there is no point in worrying about what life at a certain age should look like. Sometimes I think we’d be happier if we didn’t track our ages at all. Life should be about experiencing each day fully and enjoying the unexpected twists and turns and decisions we make along the way, not about fulfilling certain societal standards at certain benchmarks.
3. Nothing ever happens when you stay in bed.
4. We’re only human, let it go.
At the yoga retreat I did near Siem Reap, Cambodia, I was expecting to feel the same enlightenment and physical and mental release that I usually feel from doing yoga in New York City. While I enjoyed the retreat immensely, pushed my boundaries, felt surrounded by a wonderful community of kind and fascinating people, and generally had a very positive experience, I didn’t really find the “enlightenment” I was looking for. In fact, I was reminded of how very human I am in my abhorrence for one person who just got under my skin, and general emotions that pop up in an intense community – jealousy, shyness, vanity, bitterness, frustration, and insecurity, that I forgot I was still capable of having. In the end, I think it was a good thing for me to experience all of these emotions and realize that I am not yet as “evolved” as I would like to be. I know that the only person who can make you feel a certain way is yourself, and yet my self control and ability to let emotions and negative thought patterns go is a muscle that, as with all people, needs training. It wasn’t that my negative thoughts and emotions were so strong as to severely impact my experience at the retreat, but it was a good look in the mirror to learn these things about myself in the one place on the trip where I least expected to have those feelings. My awareness of the wall I was putting up, which thus far on the trip I had been so proud about not building, made it so much easier to dissolve. When I reminded myself that the other people on the retreat are also just complex, messy, evolving humans as well, I felt so much better and was able to let go of some of the feelings I was holding and open myself up more to them and social experiences at and after the retreat.
I also had a lot of anxiety at the waterfall in Luang Prabang. As everyone from my hostel tour group dashed up the steep winding path to the top of the falls, I knew that I couldn’t and didn’t want to follow, and got extremely frustrated with myself alone and parched in the heat and unable to find the swimming area of the falls, so I left in tears and took a separate tuk tuk back to town, where I broke down in an unknown buddhist temple, feeling lost yet totally aware of the poetry, before finding my hostel just across the street. It wound up perfectly fine, and I realized that it’s ok to not enjoy certain things and all the excuses I was drafting in my head to tell people were unneccesary. I’m my own person and I love who I am, and that person just does not love hiking. Furthermore, as learned in yoga, some days you can push your limits further than others, and that day was not the day, and that’s perfectly ok.