This will be a brief reflective piece born from what feels like necessity, but also admittedly steeped in a nauseatingly high degree of first-world-problemness. I’ll be heading to the airport in 2 days to embark on a trip which will take me 5,500 miles due east to Split, Croatia by way of Munich (hence the first-world-problem reference). A three–week trip to the Dalmatia coast and South-central Europe which my wife and I have been looking forward to for months. And while I have no hesitation in assuming the trip will be as essential and rewarding as I surmise it to be, I’m having more difficulty than ever with the realization that I’ll have to hit the extended pause button on my digital and professional life.
I haven’t fully wrapped my mind around what this realization represents, but I know it feels different; uncomfortable. Am I simply getting older and busier which leads to added anxiety around vacations, or is my ever-growing reliance on digital connectivity to blame for the added apprehension? My hope, as is often the case, is that through some form of creative expression and reflection I might get a glimpse of the truth prior to willingly diving into what has become an annual pursuit (necessity?) of digital darkness.
This realization started about 6 months ago when I decided that my personal website/branding needed an overhaul. I had built TaykenDesign.com a few years ago with the intention of having it function more as a secondary income source than a personally-representative digital space which honestly reflected me, and while it did function this way for a few projects, I slowly realized that I was lying with regards to who I was and how I wanted to present myself. As I started to carve out the space that now exists (90% there), I became increasingly aware of the time involved in a digital reinvention (especially when competing with a full-time job and the endless flow of other existential realities). With each passing week, I grew excited about our Croatian escape drawing closer, but simultaneously concerned about the banner color not quite being right or the form not being intuitive enough…and who the hell were these Tayken-Tots really for? Turns out they’re for me, which is exactly how it should be.
I know that I can be motivated by creating something that more authentically represented myself, and simultaneously motivated by intentionally ignoring it (even if incomplete) for a few weeks, but the idea of these possible realities coexisting was/is increasingly maddening. And while I can hear what likely needs to be said, and fully heard, stirring in the back of my head as I write this…
You’re a privileged American who’s about to board an airplane that will drop you off on the other side of the planet — shut up and deal with your shit like an adult.
…I still feel compelled to contemplate broader meaning and grapple (publicly it seems) with my own conflicts and contradictions.
Finding the right balance in life is such a subjective endeavor involving way too much contextual baggage for anything to be universal. I can already tell that this trip will very likely be revealing, for better or worse, and that’s exactly why I’m addicted to traveling and forcing myself to explore the adjacent possible. Regardless of the ever-increasing angst that seems to accompany digital disconnection, I always return home having learned something about myself…and if that’s not the meaning of life, I’m not sure what is.
