RUN AWAY WITH ME

"This is the part, you've got to say all that you're feeling, feeling

Packing a bag, we're leaving tonight when everyone's sleeping, sleeping

Let's run away, I'll run away with you

Hold on to me, I'll never want to let you go

(Run away with me, run away with me)

Over the weekend, we can turn the world to gold…"

- Carly Rae Jepson

We are young, and we are golden.

As much as I would like to say I don't have any expectations for 2017, I honestly don't think it is hard to beat 2016. Already it has kicked off to be a whole better year in comparison, in merely two months in. Only two months in and I've already ticked off another bucket list moment: to travel with my SO.

I've been to Thailand before, but only as a one night stopover. So I've had a brief taste of what its country was like. But nothing, nothing prepared me for the full experience of this amazing country, with its capital city dipped in spiritual gold. Fragrant in culture and spices, it was a beloved experience. An experience that was eagerly welcomed in its difference to my last adventure, strenuously road tripping down the East Coast of Australia. This trip was simply wandering endlessly and endlessly eating! Simple pleasures lead to happy lives.

So often we are lost in the chasing, chasing the tangible gold, that we forget that possession isn't where true happiness lies. Seeing beauty, and learning to appreciate it, is simple but enough. We want a whole lot of things, but sometimes I wonder is it really worth it? These days I'm trying to re-position my perspective. At the end of the day, the only thing we want is to be happy. We just cloud that one simple thing with a million other 'wants' in an attempt to attain it. I want to be happy and I want to cut back the bullcr*p without cutting away my dreams... without becoming lazy and demotivated.

Simplifying your wants in order to achieve the true essence of happiness is not an excuse to become a potato. I have always and will always be a dreamer and a fighter. I will never give up on the idea of working for more, in order to bring my visions, and versions of impossibilities, to life. Actions over words. But the chase to create the uncreated should not come at the price of endless suffering and sacrifice.

I need to hold up! And pull things back! 2017 is the year to make some big decisions. And "what do you want" is the biggest decision of them all. I'll tell you what I want, I've said it before and I'll say it again, I don't need no fancy cars, big homes and lavish 'everything'. I want freedom. Freedom to experience life. And freedom comes at a price. I want to earn my financial freedom, to have enough money so that it no longer drives my decisions. I want to have enough money so that I can live comfortably (yes comfortably, not lavishly) so that I can work for the sake of passion, not for the sake of surviving (bills, bills, bills). And from there onwards, anything comes at a bonus.

I will not say I don't want fancy cars, big homes and lavish 'everything'. Who doesn't want it if it was given to them obligation free? I am no hippie, I'm a realist. I want a lavish lifestyle, but I'm real enough to tell you I don't need it, and I am not willing to sacrifice my freedom to experience life (being tied down to a job) in order to fund this lavish lifestyle. I want minimal stress and a comfortable life doing whatever I want without the woes of 'money'. However life does come with sacrifices, because nothing comes free: freedom is earned. But understand what is worth sacrificing, and what is worth sacrificing for. Yes, 2017, that's what I am working for: financial freedom in order to live life filled with unburdened experiences.

And I guess this is what the spiritual culture of Thailand has brought to me: peace and wholeness. Everything unfolds, the way it unfolds, for a reason. Hong Kong never eventuated because it wasn't the right one at the time. Company is so important, and I wholeheartedly believe that I'd rather roam a city alone with boundless freedom, than to be burdened with terrible restricted company, killing my carefree, wanderlust vibes. I finally do see everything clearly now. For all those blind kids out there, you know when the optometrist asks you "This one? Or this one? Better? Or worst?" as they flip between glasses as you try and make out which makes the tiny words in front of you clearer? You think the first one was clear as day, until Mr Optometrist man hits you with something clearer. You think the one earlier was perfect, not until you've been hit with something even better. And that's when you say, yes, this one!

For those who secretly peer into my life and are thinking: "She's happy now, she thinks everything is perfect, she thinks it's forever. Wait until it all comes crumbling down and she'll be crying and saying something a whole lot different." You say that because you've been hurt before, I know that because I've said that in the past, because I've been hurt before. And I know time is a great test of everything, but experience has taught me how to distinguish what is right from wrong. I've seen enough to know 'perfect' sounds naive, and is a one way road to disappointment. But I've also 'felt enough' to now be able to distinguish what feels right from what feels wrong.

People grow, and eye-sights change, and one day Mr Optometrist man might tell me my vision has worsened and hits me with a new glass, but for now, I know this moment is 'perfect' and my vision is 20/20 in comparison to my past. Because there is no such thing as perfect, there is only better. And I know it has never felt this easy ever before... Never before have I experienced the sensation of lying there, talking and laughing, and forgetting when it all began. Like, there was no snip in time for when he arrived... that all along, he has been with me, that he has always been beside me, that all these years we have just been there with each other, in order to explain why we fit together just so perfectly. Because two people are just that, two separate people, who have actually grown up in different environments, and hence been brought up with different views and values, different memories and different experiences in order to create two different people. So explain to me, how could 22 years of different experiences cultivate two human beings who connect like they were never separated?

I'm so lucky I get to run away with someone who makes me feel so comfortable being exactly 'me'. Being able to say the random-est things from the random-est (or rudest) observations I make and not feel judged or belittled, and especially not having to worry about possibly being judged or belittled. But then he also gives me that Thai spice, it's not sugarcoated everything because the sweetness can be too much sometimes. I love Thai cuisine because it's sweet but it also has just the right amount of kick-ass spice!

In a more Thailand specific mention, the adventure was amazing but for those wishing to travel there, my advice is to bring medications for when your tummy reacts to the food. The enjoyment of our food adventures was cut short when we were left sick for the last two days. Travelling from Chiang Mai airport, Bangkok airport, Singapore airport and finally to Perth airport over a long exhausting two days was not the easiest while sick. My last advice is to Uber around if you are tired of walking. Walking is the first great option as you get to see and experience everything at a slower pace, and truly take in everything around you. Once you are tired, don't take tuk tuk or taxi become there's so much tourist scams that it is actually cheaper to just Uber. Comfortable, reliable, and definitely worth it even during surcharge times. Oh what a great time to be alive! For now I'm back into the grind to save up for my next adventures! La korn na kha!