Sabbatical States of Mind

My last few weeks before the trip I was full of anxiety. I made a list of them, and realized that my doctor friends have been doing this kind of thing (disappearing to Peru or Tibet for a month, to Salvador, Ecuador for a year) no problem. But the value of the medical profession is universal, the "to-do list" easy to come up with. And this is while they were in med school or doing a fellowship. So they were still in student mode, hadn't set down roots just yet.

I think what's big for me is that I haven't made such a large voluntary change out of my routine in a long time. Maybe a decade! I'm going to have to live without my systems and networks for now. And so I realize I'm ever so lucky that I can do this on my terms. Sometimes that seems to heighten the expectations, because I'm working in what seem to be fewer constraints.

States of mind. Well, being in front of the computer, and having had limited interaction with folks here so far (just arrived about 10 hours ago), I don't feel much different. It's slowly sinking in that I don't have a schedule here either!I read a nice piece about Vientiane in J's apt here... and that got me to start realizing where I really am. Which is exciting. The armchair is about to give way to the bus, the tuktuk, to feeling raw silk, watching the mist rise in the forest...