Running to or Running from?: The Journey from My Head to My Heart in One Hundred Moves

In January of 2001, I boarded a plane in Denver, headed for Seattle, which was the meeting place of for the Peace Corps orientation session I would attend before departing for Thailand. I was fifty-six years old and was headed on a journey that I was well-qualified for as a nurse and reiki instructor. But in many ways, I felt completely unprepared.
There were eleven of us over the age of fifty in the group and another twenty-one who were younger than us. So, while I didn’t feel entirely out of place, I wondered what the next two years of my life had in store for me. Was I crazy? Some might think so. But I was also excited. The possibilities and adventures that awaited me were completely foreign, literally. Yet, I was wanting, needing, to fill the hole inside myself. I was running away from my past and
hopefully, finally, filling the hole with a true sense of self and well-being. Running was what I did, after all, and now I was running halfway around the world to another country. That certainly did sound insane, but I was too tired to think about that now.
I was also excited, scared, sad, happy. Most of all, I just wanted to get going; but get going to what? I never was just in the now; never was content in the present. My restlessness kept me moving and filled me with anxiety. I was always looking for happiness in the adventure of a new class, job or certification--always something outside myself, moving forward, anticipating the future while carrying the sadness of the past.
I was hopeful that everything that I had prepared for prior to my trip to Thailand and my upcoming volunteer work in the Peace Corps would help me to learn to live in the moment and be more present.
It was late when we arrived in Seattle and I was mentally, physically, and spiritually exhausted. Yet, we still had an orientation to get through and an international flight ahead of us. We were all sitting in the airport waiting for our plane, quietly existing in our own separate worlds, with our thoughts turning to the sum total of the lives we had each experienced up to that point. All of us were placing our best foot forward and wearing whatever masks were veiling our true selves.