I have recently realised that I have traveled to 45 countries. I have also just moved to Australia, where one of the first people I met told me to get (back) into writing.

“Follow your passion”, was her message for me. And she could not have been more right. “Do something you love and you never have to work a day in your life”. I guess they don’t say that for nothing, right?

See, I love writing. I have written diaries every day since I was 12!
But then somehow I have gotten worse about keeping up with it. This “slumber” started at some point in 2014 and I still haven’t really gotten over it. I mean, I just travelled to Europe and Southeast Asia for 4 months and I literally had to make myself work on the travel journal along the way. Not because I don’t enjoy scribbling down my memories while selecting, cutting, and glueing receipts and pictures to turn it into an almost interactive scrapbook – once I start, I actually love it so much I don’t ever want to stop – but more so because I felt that I couldn’t find the time. There was always something to do, something to see, or some (other) work to be done. The result is that I am now more than two months behind. I am sitting in my new house in Melbourne, when my diary is still roaming the streets of Hanoi back in June.

And then there is the intention of keeping a travel blog.
How in the world is that supposed to fit into my already way too busy schedule?
The intention was there, I promise. The intention has always been there. The reality, however, is that I only managed to post a ‘grand total’ of 6 posts in 4 months on my business blog. And I got really disappointed about it.

It started to make me wonder. How did I do this in the past?
Did I sit down every night to talk about what I’d gotten myself into during the day? Did I consciously clear out part of my schedule for writing? Or maybe I worked on it over the weekends, trying to catch up on last week’s adventures.

Truth is, I probably did all of the above. I know I did all of the above.
But another truth is, I was single then. Or at least, living on my own.

“What does that have to do with anything”, you say?
Well… In my case, everything. For some people there is an important lesson to learn here. I am one of those people who really need to learn how to go about finding “Me Time”.

As it turns out, I am not so good at doing my OWN things in my OWN time. And MAKING TIME to do them. In fact, I really suck at it.

My partner, on the other hand, is an expert on finding the time for his own things. He uses every moment of his free time to read news articles, for example, or to research history topics online.

And you know what? I don’t give him credit for it.
Oh h*** no! Instead, I resent him for it.

Needless to say, not a very healthy and sustainable situation. 😉

Time to do something about it!
It took the kind words of a stranger to finally let it sink in, but here’s a piece of advice to myself: Grow up, Marly!
And STOP cleaning the house, doing finances, or washing clothes, when enjoying some “Me” time is what you really should be doing. You’ll see that there will be far less reason to yell irrationalities at your partner. (“It’s so unfair! Why can you just sit around doing nothing while I have to work all the time?!”) In the end, you spend less time fighting frivolous fights, and more time doing something you love. I’d say that kills two birds with one stone! 🙂

Lesson learned. Now let’s hope I can stick with it.

For now? Here I am. Writing.
And you’re on my new travel blog, so….. So far, so good!

My time? My treasure.