who have experienced atrocities one can
only imagine but through their hardships
they shared how they found their
strength their voice and joy and life
again and while they shared with me
these brave stories I listened in awe
and admiration I didn’t know if I had it
in me to face my fears the way that
these women had but on my own journey I
would come to understand that not only
is courage something we choose it’s a
movement and to understand how these
women’s stories would be pivotal for me
I want to share with you the adventure
that I’ve been walking for almost four
years now one that I’m still on today in
2014 I left my home in Oregon to walk my
way around the world now that probably
tells you my sense of adventure is very
slow walking allows me to connect to the
people the environment and myself as
fully as possible
now I often do get asked if I wanted to
go on a walk why didn’t I just go hike
the Camino or walk the Pacific Crest
Trail but the thing is I wasn’t looking
to go walking nor was I even seeking an
adventure I wanted to feel the world my
walk is not about counting the
kilometers or checking off the countries
it’s more like an experiment of living
on less trying to give more relishing
solitude while immersing into the world
now ambling around the world is a
decently crazy idea particularly for me
I’m an introvert before I began I had
just done a few short day hikes I had
never camped alone didn’t even really
build a great campfire looking at a
topographical map or navigating with a
compass was a foreign language
I was simply a woman with a compelling
idea for an adventure one that would
ultimately have me dismantle my cozy
life as you can see I was essentially
trading in pencil skirts for thermal
underwear a career for homelessness and
putting my few belongings into a cart
quickly elevating me to bag lady status
because I do pick things up off the side
of the road that are useful and I carry
all my rubbish until I can dispose of it
there are four guidelines that I live by
on this walk
the first is self-sufficiency so I carry
all my own food gear and supplies in a
cart that I’ve named Athena second is
affordability while I try to help raise
money for organizations that support
girls and women the only way that I can
afford to do this is I give myself a
budget of five dollars or less a day and
that means I always camp outdoors and my
dinners are usually two-minute noodles
the third is intuitive mapping so my
walk is not a continuous line I walk
country by country and it’s shaped
usually by my gut instinct where I feel
called to go sometimes it’s the people I
meet what’s happening in the environment
or politically that shape where I walk
next and lastly is walking every step
myself so no form of transportation
helps me to cross the country I’m
walking now before I begin I did know
some of the challenges I might face like
losing toenails or not showering for
days turns out sometimes weeks
exhaustion loneliness and extreme
weather and then there were the
worst-case scenarios but I always knew
were a possibility especially being a
woman walking alone and my worst fear
would take place one night in Mongolia
that would forever change my visceral
understand
of courage and strengthen my
it was spring but the ground was still
heavy with snow I had walked 23 miles I
made camp and a peanut butter and jelly
sandwich I watched as the Sun set over
the undulating hills of the steppes it’s
utterly perfect solitude
now I had already endured heatstroke in
Australia and dengue and Vietnam so I
was feeling a little seasoned perhaps a
little overconfident and comfortable but
I was still surprised and unprepared
when a Mongolian nomads made his way
into my tent that was the longest night
of my life
it felt like an eternity as I sat in a
ravine trying to grasp the reality that
I had just been raped every woman’s
nightmare and the very reason that women
are so often discouraged from even
attempting solo adventures in the first
place I felt shame and I felt like I had
failed in some way but as I sat in that
ravine I began muttering memorized
poetry to calm my mind and my body and
in this moment I went through some
self-blame thinking about how I could
have done things differently or
prevented it I felt like I had let down
all the women who feared this for
themselves or even for me but as I move
past those places I came to a place of
acceptance of what just took place and
that’s when I could see two choices
clearly in front of me I could give up
and go home because the fear that this
could happen again could be just too
overwhelming or find the courage to keep
walking I was alone in a muddy pit in
the middle of Mongolia I was terrified
and that’s when I remembered I
remembered those fearless women the ones
who had shared their stories of pain and
triumph who had endured brutality but
found peace and love I could see their
faces and hear their voices they were
human like me they were women like me
and this was the moment I was beginning
to understand that there is no
difference between the women I admired
and myself they chose to step towards
what they feared and discover what they
were capable of they chose courage so
could i by the time the Sun rose that
morning I had made my decision and as I
put one foot in front of the other with
the faces and stories of those women
encouraging me I became more determined
than ever to keep moving it started with
footsteps but as I kept walking it
expanded I was walking West but I was
walking towards forgiveness towards joy
and humor trust and love we are not
alone in our fears and by standing up
and telling our stories we are
connecting and encouraging each other it
felt like I had finished walking across
Mongolia with several women holding my
hand and heart and as I continued
walking today I make efforts to meet
with local women so that we can share
our stories and connect through our
experiences so I see courage as a verb
it’s a motion because you can’t do it
standing still when we know what we’re
afraid of
it is the very action of moving towards
it that is courageous not the end Rizzo
it is the movement forward and it
doesn’t take a grand adventure or a
crisis for us to choose courage it takes
courage to start a business to take a
risk to follow your heart when everyone
else wants you to do something different
or to love in the face of rejection or
pain I now know that it is the
willingness to be afraid and to be
totally and completely vulnerable in how
we live our lives as we step into our
challenges courage is a practice and
it’s when you keep walking that you find it thank you