RICKY ON THE RUN

Tragically I am not here enough when I have free time. 

Life at home is tough when you constantly have an itch to travel. 

But I want to make a commitment to experience more of Seattle. 

There’s so much going on out here. 

The city is expanding so rapidly. 

There is much to see.

First of all, happy new year!

I just completed my first yoga session of the year and struggling is an understatement. Maybe my muscles were a bit exhausted from my intense weightlifting week (I really had something to prove). Or maybe taking a week off from my practice just really threw me off. Regardless, we call it practice for a reason. 

While going through our poses, I found myself analyzing myself much more frequently than usual. My arm wasn’t high enough, I was leaning too far forward, or my feet were in the wrong position. Every time I recognized these things, I began to readjust myself. Tighten up here, loosen up there.

During this new year we should be doing the same thing with our lives. We don’t necessarily need an entirely brand “new” you. We just need to assess what we currently have. What we’ve built already. What worked for me? What (or who) should I cut out? Did I hold onto something too long? What do I need to work on? How can I be better?

Let’s all make these small adjustments. Every aspect about you and your life has led you to where you are. Love and accept that. There is nothing inherently wrong with you! But we can all choose to work on being an even better version of ourselves, for the sake of our spiritual growth. Every little adjustment will compound to the better you. The 2017 you.  

Tighten up!

November

Maybe a weakness is an underlying strength of mine. I am a lover, point blank. A deep lover. There is no other version of me that I can project into the world. I don’t know how to process/express this emotion any other way. I cannot fake who I am. This is what makes me, me. I cannot call it a fault. Only a blessing.

December

All in all, this has been a great month for me. It was time to right the ship, and write the story. My team and I have all been extremely focused on progressing. Both individually and collectively. We have high, lofty ambitions for 2017. This month was used as a running start, and it has been working out perfectly. We’ve adopted this wolf mentality that has paid dividends.

I am three weeks removed from one of the most amazing trips i’ve ever embarked upon. I cringe when I start to wonder how I will be able to top this.

We saw the seven wonders of the world. In a 25-day marathon of a trip. I never imagined that I'd end up seeing them all in my lifetime. 

I have never been to any of the countries that we visited, neither has Jeano. It took much more coordination and planning. Normally, I like to focus on a short list of places/things I want to see and play an audible for the rest of the trip. It allows me to take my time and get a little lost, as opposed to squeezing a ton of things in a finite amount of time. That would stress me out beyond belief. Traveling would feel like a chore, instead of a relief. One thing I always tell myself is that if I miss out on something, I will use it as a good excuse to return.

But this trip was a different animal. Jeano and I had a finite 25 days to complete this goal. Contrary to popular belief, we have real obligations to get back to lol. We planned our itinerary about a month prior to the first day. This is when we booked a good chunk of our lodging, entrance tickets, and flights. Our itinerary also consisted of time to explore the city we were in. Being flexible is key when traveling (with me, at least). Once the itinerary was complete, we began gauging interest from the rest of our friends. Understandably, not everyone can take 25 days off of work. But John B would join us in Brazil, Tradell in Rome. Angel would also join in Rome, and Jay R in Brazil/Peru. If you plan on taking a multi-country trip, I highly suggest this approach. Having a new friend in each destination provides a fresh perspective. You also get to add new memories with more people.

Aside from our own friends, there were so many great people that we crossed paths with during this trip. I would say that we befriended at least 1 person per city. In time, I will share a tidbit about a few of the people I met along the way. Everyone has a story, and we should never forget that.

More photos and video to come...

These past few weeks have been so, so busy. I am trying to find a balance between enjoying my travels, as well as remembering to post.

I went to France for the first time, Chicago for the 25th anniversary Lollapalooza, and Portland for a wedding. All three very different experiences, to say the least.

I had a long recap for these three travels, but I think it would be better if I just shared a few things that I learned:

Soon, you will be unable to do things. Due to a variety of reasons, you will be unable to chase the ends of the earth. You won't have the time to pull yourself up to the top of a mountain. You will have to trade in your wild days for more sedentary things. I learned this while I was aqua trekking the Gorges Du Verdon in the south of France. Honestly one of the toughest things I have ever done. It consisted of hiking down a mountain, body rafting yourself down the rapids (with only your life vest), cliff diving, and hiking/rock climbing back up the mountain with your 40lbs of wet gear. It was my first, and most likely my last time. But afterwards, I knew that this was something that I would remember forever. Having a kid or marrying someone doesn’t mean you still can’t do wild and fun activities. But it will be much easier for you to give yourself an excuse not to. I know for a fact that I won’t be risking my life as much, when a little human relies on me to survive. If you’re free now, risk it all.

Create a tradition with your friends. Lollapalooza is one of the things that I really look forward to, every year. This year was essentially a partying marathon. The festival was wild. The performances were mesmerizing. After parties kept us out late (some until 6am). I'm not sure how we survived the 4-day festival weekend, but Lolla did not let me down. I'm glad I had the chance to experience it with some of my closest friends too. It's a weekend that I'll never forget. A weekend I can’t wait to experience next year too.

Marriage will be priceless. It doesn’t matter where you will have it or what color you will wear. What matters is who will be there under the same roof. That is all.

I am a firm believer in the idea of surrounding yourself with people who continually challenge you to grow. To be stronger, to be greater, to love harder, and to forgive faster. I have been blessed with the opportunity to cross paths with some amazing people in my life. I am also blessed to call these people my friends and family. 

Last weekend, I had the opportunity to spend time with my Thinkparty team (more info on Thinkparty soon). We rented a small discreet cabin in northern Wisconsin for our Q3 meeting. After discussing our past two quarters, we set ourselves up for the days ahead. These next few months will be HUGE. I am always in the greatest mood when we’re all together, especially since we’re all dwelling in different parts of the country. 

There are some great things happening soon which we cannot wait to share with the world!

I’m not sure if there was a better way to wake up on a Sunday:

Now, more than ever, it is important to stop and appreciate the people that have entered your life.

These are my blessings.

Photos by John B and me.

This was one of the first pictures I took when I moved to NYC. It was my first night in the city, so I texted my new friend Tradell (whom I met the summer before). He invited me to his friend’s play that night. I have zero recollection of what the play was about. I just remember sitting in the front and staring at this girl about 30 feet in the air, suspended on strips of fabric. I remember thinking to myself “This is crazy, I am really here! This is my new life. Thick girls dancing in the air.” I keep this picture in my camera roll to remind myself where I was in life. 

I am the type of person to reflect on my past, at every opportunity. I love it. I’m a reflection whore. I take every opportunity to assess my current situation so I can compare and contrast. In my mind, its fun. Its fun to see how far in life I’ve made it (and how far I still have to go). It is also useful. If I am not a better person than who I was in the past, I make the necessary adjustments. Because if I don’t tweak my life to become better, then whats the point of living? Only recently have I learned to not seek perfection, but growth. Progression will keep you motivated. Perfection was the main roadblock from me creating this blog in the first place. What website should I use? How should the layout be? What will your content be? Who should read this? How often should I post?

All these questions that I constantly constantly constantly stressed, kept me from actually creating. I was running around in circles, worrying about each detail. But thanks to some planning and push from my squad, I finally have this up and running!

I really should have just examined other parts of my life to learn this. I love working out. I exercise about five times a week. I’m a closet gym rat. I write down my lifts after each workout. This allows me to go back and look at my stats. I used to just show up at the gym, lift a few heavy things, and call it a day. Without documenting, I never knew if I was making any real progress. I could have used the eyeball approach and say “yup, your arms are bigger, good job brah”, but I feel like the moment I started writing down my progress, was the moment that I actually made real progress.

Whatever you want to do, just begin with the first step. You will suck. There is no way around it. But you will get better as you keep on going, I promise. Houses aren’t built in a day and neither will your dreams be. Admittedly, I still revise my writing 100x prior to posting. I promise to only slightly freak out before each post. I’m glad you can’t see me pulling my hair out as I write. 

But hey, I’m working on that.

It has been about a year since I began my traveling adventures. Before that, I lived in a crusty, crowded 5-bedroom brownstone in Brooklyn. I shared it with some of the craziest roommates ever. Some that called in fake bomb threats on our building, some that stole my shoes from me, and some that literally left our bathroom splattered in blood. But those stories can wait for another day.

Growing up, I always knew there was more out there than my immediate surroundings. Like any kid, I had a bucket list which included countries I wanted to see. These were just some optimistic ideas to hopefully revisit and cross off somewhere down the line. It was never my life goal to travel the world. But life itself gets in the way and you eventually get too busy working to pay back your damn student loans. Lofty goals take a backseat to putting a roof over your head and food on the table. Your dreams somehow get lost in the shuffle of life and in the blink of an eye, you’re two years deep into complacency. 

But if you make some adjustments, life can lead you on an amazing little journey. I’ve learned that life can be as breathtaking or vanilla as you want it to be. What led me to my current lifestyle is likely the same thing that led me to move away from my hometown (as well as New York). I would coin it a Life Audit. In this audit, time freezes for a moment, and all you can think about is the assessment of your life. These questions enter your thought process and suddenly you’re deathly afraid to answer them:

Are you happy with what you’re doing? Would you be happy if it continued this way? Are you putting enough effort in? Are you reaching your goals? Do you need to make a change? Can you give and do more? Then why aren’t you?

My Life Audit in New York took place while I was sitting in my bedroom on another unassuming day. It was my day off and my thoughts invaded me after I took a glance at my bucket list. I distinctly remember asking myself: When will you experience Tokyo? Now, Japan has never been an OMG-goals-af must-see bucket list type of destination for me. But I always thought that it was a unique enough country that I would want to experience it at least once in life. Something similar to how moving to New York felt like. But this was the simple question that lit the fire under my ass. This was the question that (once again) altered the course of my life. 

Fast forward a year later and now I’ve crossed off a few countries. I’ve connected with strangers. I’ve made some priceless memories which I can now share/laugh at forever. I turned a joke of a hashtag into something meaningful for myself. The most beautiful thing about how it all played out, was that none of this was planned. I’ve got so much more to see and so far to go. I can’t help but feel excited for whats about to unfold. I can only promise you two things:

1. I will try my best.

2. It’s about to be one hell of a ride.