I love to travel. It seems like an obvious thing to say as an expat, but there are expats who live abroad and see the world and there are expats who live abroad as they would in their home countries. I am of the former.
Despite this love of travel, I detest the process of getting from destination to destination, especially by air. Even before C19 forced a return to isolationist practices and more careful attention to cleanliness, I was not a fan of the security checks, lines for boarding, and sharing of seat or public ‘germy’ 🦠 spaces.
After having been off flying for about a year and a half, I took my first flight last month on a short visit to Malta 🇲🇹. Even after a hiatus, my habit of falling asleep before the plane had even taken off was fully in form. It has been a laughed about trait of mine, as a family tale that most have been impressed with – an enviable gift to be able to quickly fall asleep on any moving form of transportation.
Yet, as age sets in and I become more mindful of the impact of my surroundings and past experiences on my psyche, I think I have discovered why my mind and body reboots.
Ever since reading Susan Cain’s book Quiet: The Power of Introverts in a World That Can’t Stop Talking, I have proudly accepted and worn the badge with raised hands – I am an introvert; almost to an extreme. Also, I have accepted that I am greatly impacted by others’ energies, seeing auras in shades of light. Therefore, thrusting me into a small space where sounds abound and strange energies swarm causes an input overload for me. Thus, I feel the need to fall asleep. It’s as if my brain says “nope, cannot process, rebooting now!”
As a test of this, on our recent flight ✈️ from The Netherlands 🇳🇱, I put on my AirPods with noise cancellation mode on and magically, I didn’t feel the need to sleep as the plane started taxing on the runway. The blocking out of sounds and keeping my eyes averted from the energies around me prevented the usual overload so that I did not feel an urge to shutdown.
While I still enjoy a good nap on a plane or being able to catch a few z’s 😴 during travel, I am also feeling more prepared to re-enter the world as it starts to return to a new sense of normal armed with newly acknowledged tricks up my sleeve to be able to interact again with hopefully a bit less stress and anxiety about being amongst others. 😜
~T 🔥🐉♋️
I’m impressed with your positive effort of self improvement. I’t seems to me it’s a trait not many people have, including myself, It has left me with something to think about in my old age.
I believe it is never too late nor impossible to improve oneself if one desires it. 😀