Two years ago I had the realization that my life was missing something. I mean, I was comfortable: I had a decent job making good money, I had great friends that I saw often, an amazing community around me (including my family), and I loved my home in Colorado. But I wasn't fully satisfied. I knew that there was more to life than the way I was living it. So I decided to do something kind of crazy.

I have always been an adventurous spirit. I find myself thinking about life differently than others. I don't care about material things, I don't have a desire to have a secure and safe career path, and I certainly do not like routine. So this decision of mine to up my life and travel for a month and a half through 12 foreign countries, of which I do not know the language, or currency, or how their public transportation works, was actually not that crazy for me. In fact, my mother was not surprised at all when I told her of my plans; scared, but not surprised. This was a decision that I knew would change my perspective of the world and the way I lived my life. I had never felt more sure about a decision I had made before.

To be completely transparent, this decision was also derived from my desperation to end the "long-distance" aspect of my relationship with my boyfriend at the time. We started dating in college when I was a sophomore and were together for three years there before I moved back to Colorado to advance my career. We then did three more years of long-distance with no real end in sight. He was the love of my life but neither of us were willing to move to each other. So I came up with the idea of going on a trip together and then figuring out what direction our lives were headed in afterwards. This idea scared him but he didn't tell me until a few months before our planned trip, when he let me know he wasn't going on the trip with me and that he didn't know if he wanted to be with me. This, of course, broke my heart but I knew, more than ever, that I was meant to go on this trip. I knew that I was meant to go alone all along. This was my eat-pray-love.

Planning for this trip was scary but exciting at the same time. I wanted to go everywhere, see everything, and do everything but, of course, that was impossible so I narrowed it down to 12 countries (haha, joke! That's still a lot). I did a ton of research before going on my trip and most of the blogs I read agreed on two things: don't over pack and don't try to cram in too many places. But, of course, I ignored their advice and planned an insane itinerary. When I showed it to be people, they thought I was crazy. I had 6 weeks to make it to 22 cities. When you do the math, that comes out to less than 2 days in each city. I even thought I might be pushing it but I so desperately wanted to see each of the places on my list that I decided to make it work. I started calling it my rendezvous trip: the trip where I determine which places I wanted to go back to. And I did actually make it work. Having completed the trip, I can safely say that I don't regret my decision to squeeze in so many places during one trip. I don't know that many people would enjoy the type of travel I did but, for me, it was perfect. I loved waking up in a new city or town or countryside every day or two and I didn't mind the traveling part because I got to see so many cool places by bus, train, car, boat, and plane. That was part of the experience for me.

This trip was eye-opening for me and I had a lot of epiphanies that made me redirect my future and where I was headed in life. When you are traveling alone, you have a lot of time to contemplate your life. You realize that doing the things you love and cherishing your loved ones are the only things that really matter in life. Everything else is bullshit. I vowed to myself that I would not let the judgments of those around me dictate my choices anymore and that I would build a life I truly loved living.