A not-so-brief introduction to the nature and structure of this podcast and all future episodes to come as told by the narrator himself, M.K. Lott.
Get lost so you can find your way home.
I say that a lot to myself. Especially since as of this writing I'm in my 20's, when I am nothing but pure potential with a couple of life skills to get me by and pay rent. This phrase originally came about not as a phrase, but a title. I made the decision that one day if I had an interesting enough life, that would be the title of my autobiography. And then, it wasn't for an autobiography. It was for a memoir of my transcendental and spiritual travels in my life and how my big, grand bundle of adventures was a metaphor to live the most fulfilling life regardless of scale. And while the idea of a memoir/autobiography, like so many of my ideas, showed up, had its time in the spotlight, and then disappeared unceremoniously, the title stayed in my head. And then the title over time sprouted into a philosophy.
When I say "Get lost so you can find your way home", I'm shortening a philosophy that says in order to develop a more positive and appreciative outlook on your life and yourself, you have to experience uncharted waters and discover the world over and over again since I believe there are simply too many perspectives to see the world through to just be sufficient with your own. By seeing what makes people tick, how the world ticks, or how you tick when you're out of your element, you learn to grow and love in ways that you wouldn't be able to understand or realize simply because you never got the experience to. And when I mean uncharted waters, I mean that sometimes, sometimes, it's important to follow a previously built path. It's important to do what others have done before you like go to school, train for something so you're less likely to create risky mistakes, or get a day job to pay the bills and keep you afloat. But it's just as important to find new paths and your own way to do things. In your 20's, that's a typically daunting idea because, you're in your 20's. You're in that weird limbo between kid and adult and you don't know what your own way to do things and what your own path looks like. But if you let it, your life can be a constantly beautiful exploration of that, in your 20's especially but also even older than that. This philosophy of life has no expiration date. Well... I guess death is a pretty evident expiration date.
And when you come back from your adventures or journeys and reunite with loved ones or walk through the door of your home, my god. I never thought my love and gratitude for those things would be so plentiful, yet continue to grow at the same time. Not to mention picking up a new kind of level for self-love. Often, when I capitalize on this philosophy I find myself having a new kind of self-respect and self-esteem. As someone who grew up programmed to not ask for help, was very risk-adverse, and had a scarcity/victim mindset, I can't help but find a new kind of joy in the fact that after an epoch or a new experience, I think to myself "I was lost. I didn't think I could do it. But somehow, through my own innovation and mistakes, I made it home. And boy, do I have a story for you."
