Thus far, the Before It’s Gone Journey has been a process of creating something out of nothing. The project existed only as a hypothetical possibility until we took dedicated action to bring it in to the realm of reality. Yet despite constantly thinking about and discussing our future plans, the fact that we will actually be departing on this journey in just a few months time still feels completely surreal to us. We were craving something tangible, so we responded with “the wall.”
The Wall does indeed refer to a real wall, one in our spare bedroom cleared of hanging pictures and furniture to make way for a floor-to-ceiling collage. It serves a dual purpose of a vision board and detailed planning tool. It began as an outlet for dreaming big, a place to collect our random scraps of paper with scribbled down ideas, pages ripped from magazines of ideal destinations, and profiles of inspirational people working on the issues we care about. Stuck to the wall, they are not easily lost or forgotten.
The collage is now sprawling onto the adjoining walls with more ideas and resources than we will ever be able to pursue. I’m okay with that. I take comfort in living in a world of possibility. Commitment is largely a process of narrowing options, which often leaves me feeling metaphorically claustrophobic. Simply documenting the many potential paths our journey may lead us is calming rather than overwhelming.
Of course, what does feel overwhelming is the endless list of things to do in order to successfully launch this idealistic endeavor. Therefore, the wall also prominently features a timeline of self-imposed deadlines, attempting to light a fire under our butts in order to minimize the inevitable panicked crush of rushing around two weeks before we depart. In theory, stuck to the wall, these tasks are not easily ignored. However, we have managed to fall woefully behind on our carefully parceled out month-to month checkpoints of progress. Like I said, the pre-departure panicked crush is inevitable. We have traveled enough to at least know that much, but we figured it’s worth a preventative try anyway…
If you live in our area, we invite you to come check out our wall in person. We’ll gladly tape up your contributions of ideas and advice, as several of our friends have already done. If you can’t make it over, we encourage you to follow Before It’s Gone Journey on Pinterest. We have boards that correlate to the categories on our wall of possibilities and preparation (which is essentially our low-tech version of Pinterest anyway). Please pin your own ideas and thoughts to our boards as well!
In case you are not familiar with Pinterest, I think it is a wonderful concept for collecting and organizing ideas without having to hold on to files (or piles) (or walls) of papers. It is actually the only social media platform that I truly get excited about! We are using it to share the inspiration of our vision board with you, as well as some nuts and bolts information for those interested in the logistics of cycle touring, gear, and specific destinations. We hope you find it Pinteresting!
The Wall does indeed refer to a real wall, one in our spare bedroom cleared of hanging pictures and furniture to make way for a floor-to-ceiling collage. It serves a dual purpose of a vision board and detailed planning tool. It began as an outlet for dreaming big, a place to collect our random scraps of paper with scribbled down ideas, pages ripped from magazines of ideal destinations, and profiles of inspirational people working on the issues we care about. Stuck to the wall, they are not easily lost or forgotten.
The collage is now sprawling onto the adjoining walls with more ideas and resources than we will ever be able to pursue. I’m okay with that. I take comfort in living in a world of possibility. Commitment is largely a process of narrowing options, which often leaves me feeling metaphorically claustrophobic. Simply documenting the many potential paths our journey may lead us is calming rather than overwhelming.
Of course, what does feel overwhelming is the endless list of things to do in order to successfully launch this idealistic endeavor. Therefore, the wall also prominently features a timeline of self-imposed deadlines, attempting to light a fire under our butts in order to minimize the inevitable panicked crush of rushing around two weeks before we depart. In theory, stuck to the wall, these tasks are not easily ignored. However, we have managed to fall woefully behind on our carefully parceled out month-to month checkpoints of progress. Like I said, the pre-departure panicked crush is inevitable. We have traveled enough to at least know that much, but we figured it’s worth a preventative try anyway…
If you live in our area, we invite you to come check out our wall in person. We’ll gladly tape up your contributions of ideas and advice, as several of our friends have already done. If you can’t make it over, we encourage you to follow Before It’s Gone Journey on Pinterest. We have boards that correlate to the categories on our wall of possibilities and preparation (which is essentially our low-tech version of Pinterest anyway). Please pin your own ideas and thoughts to our boards as well!
In case you are not familiar with Pinterest, I think it is a wonderful concept for collecting and organizing ideas without having to hold on to files (or piles) (or walls) of papers. It is actually the only social media platform that I truly get excited about! We are using it to share the inspiration of our vision board with you, as well as some nuts and bolts information for those interested in the logistics of cycle touring, gear, and specific destinations. We hope you find it Pinteresting!
RSS Feed
