Its been nearly three weeks now since I’ve been back after my circumnavigation. Already I feel itchy to get back out there and am feeling trapped on land again. I am frustrated by constantly needing to use my wheels and relying on my electric front wheel to tackle more difficult surfaces. I’m desperate to just go where I want, when I want and not need any help to do that. I feel so reliant on other people, on accessible surfaces, on equipment. I hate that it all makes me feel weak when I know I’m not.
Its crazy but even now having just achieved something incredible and set the record I am still doubting myself. Doubting whether I’m good enough, doubting what is to come next, doubting whether I really have the makings of a proper sailor. I’m trying to read Ellen MacArthur book, and I can’t help but compare myself to her. To see if I measure up against her, to see if I could one day achieve the things she has done. I try and look for parallels in our characteristics, to see if I’m enough like her to have potential. Inevitably in my head I fall short, never seeing to be made of the right stuff to achieve what she has.
I think also the nerves have set in. I know where I want to go, I want to sail around the world solo, non-stop and unassisted. I want to complete in the likes of the World Star or the Vendee Globe. I want to change people’s perceptions of what someone with a disability can do. Yet I’m not sure how I will get there. Sometimes that end goal of sailing around the world just feels too far out of reach.
The financial pressures of Fear are also weighing on me. I budgeted to get us around our circumnavigation, but I never really contemplated what comes next. I especially wasn’t expecting the bills that have come since we’ve been back to carry out the repairs to get her back to her best. I worry about even being able to pay the berth fee. And I know all this would fade away if I could sail her because it always does. Because when I sail her, I remember that it doesn’t matter how much she costs me what she gives me is worth 10x more than that and is something you cant put a price on. But for now, she is on land and so am I, both of us feeling stuck.
More than anything my soul is longing for the sea, for there to be nothing but me, her, the sea and the sky. That endless place where just about anything feels possible, no expectations and no limitations. Just endless possibilities, where if you can dare to dream it, you can do it.
I know everything will work out as life has a funny way of doing that. However, that doesn’t make times like this any easier. There is no purpose to this post, I simply wanted to share the truth, in the hopes that maybe it might make one person feel less alone.