Week 16: Adaptability
Question:
What are the weird ways you help yourself adapt?
Last week, I left my home to move to a foreign city, for a job I didn’t know much about. I drove out of Colorado at 5am, on clear Tuesday morning. The road was silent and empty besides my loyal Toyota Corolla, Charlie, packed with my life, a sleepy boyfriend and a rubber chicken with a rosary, that had crossed the Atlantic, around its neck.
I was as prepared as I would ever be.
Earl, the chicken, is somewhat of a family heirloom. If you know anything about the Van Wormer/Wogan clan, it’s that we take our rubber chickens seriously. They are our good luck charms, guardians, and silent companions along the alluring road of adventure. They have witnessed it all.
Earl was the monarch of the crew so I was shocked to find, midsts a tearful goodbye, Earl being passed into my unsteady hands. Wrapped lovingly around his neck, was a rosary an Italian family had given to my sister, on a boat, on the way from Croatia to Italy.
With these gifts by my side, I could not fail.
But my first night, after placing said sleepy boyfriend on a return flight to my no-longer-home, I felt nothing but failure.
It was wrapped up in exhaustion but there it was, facing me in a strange room, with the sound of the city accosting my mind. Fear crawled through me, leaving a quaking mess in its wake as my mind delighting in a continuous mental flagellation.
Change brings these nights to the surface. It stirs up emotions that repetition kept dormant. So I sat in the graceless mess of it all, questioning every decision I had ever made.
Earl watched this all from his perch. Cool and calm. He knew although I hadn’t remembered it yet, that I was adaptable. That I knew how to bend and wrap into lives I had never considered. He watched the morning come and the perspective it brought. He knew that once I gave in and stopped trying to make the situation something it wasn't, I would find me again. Then I would remember to trust in my adaptability.
Never doubt the wisdom of a rubber chicken.
Impact
Way of the Peaceful Warrior is the perfect book for just about any time in your life. It was especially wonderful to listen to as I drove from CO to CA and for newness. It's a quick and easy read but filled with some serious juice. If you haven't read it, grab a copy and dive in.
I also have been loving the StartUp Podcast by Gimlet Media. After the first episode, I was hooked!
Create
I have cast about to find something tangible I created this week. Then I realized, I have spent my past two weeks creating a life in a new city. It hasn't been easy but the adventure has just begun.