My first visit to the Central American jewel Costa Rica played out like the pages of a guide book for self-help junkies. There was nature, outdoor adventure, beach leisure, local cuisine, indigenous critter sighting, boating and plenty of downtime for thinking and reflection all wrapped up with a healthy dose of limit pushing fun and phobia. Worthy of Aerosmith lyrics and way more than a vacation, my time in this volcanic paradise proved to be a real trip.
Getting There
On approach from thousands of feet overhead, Costa Rica and its capital San Jose weren’t immediately visible, thanks to dense, ash-laden clouds. But the closer to the surface the plane came, the more I could see the first signs of the lush, vibrant land that awaited me. I was in the country to attend the wedding of a good friend in Sugar Beach, a Pacific Ocean hugging resort about five hours northwest of San Jose, in the Guanacaste province. The drive, on a mostly two lane highway, provided a great opportunity to surveil the countryside.
From town to town, majestic and forested hills hugged the pavement trafficked by cars, motorbikes and tourist vans. Tucked into those same hills, colorful homes of many sizes, coffee trees and roadside businesses peeked out like curious eyes. The most impressive sight was the diversity of green: all hues, all heights, all textures, and manner of growing. Some of the greens reminded me of emeralds while some reminded me of unripened bananas. In the distance the mountains rose up, with a cover of those same dense clouds above. The only effect that seemed to mute the colors was the coming of the rain, which lent a gloomy, dark character to the atmosphere enveloping our van in a sheer fog that seemed like thin silk.
Being There
Arriving at the resort was the cherry on top. We arrived at night and the onset of evening had been spurred by a sunset wash over the mountains that yielded a warm, molten lava that turned the sky into a soup of pink, red and blue. When the sun finally set there were so few street lights that the road was pitch black. But for the few seconds between passing vehicles’ headlights, this seemed a lonesome, dark place, thick with mystery and vegetative silhouettes . It managed to be elegant and crude all at once.
The Sugar Beach Hotel itself was rustic and natural, sitting on the rocky volcanic edges of the Pacific as though it had been there for a thousand years. This would be my home base for the next week; a week of adventures that would push me past limits I hadn’t even realized I harbored. From sailing over the jungle on steel cables to swimming in the ocean and wandering around in bathing suits for hours on end, this vacation ended up helping me get over perceived and real fears in the most enjoyable and fun ways I could have ever imagined..
Being Back
A vacation is always some kind of trip, but it’s not always a legitimate journey. How often do we all come home from the obligatory long weekend at the beach, week with the family in an unknown city or business trip sightseeing extension with not much more than some photos, a couple of memorable stories and the resolution to do it again and more often? Much less often do excursions have an effect on the very fabric of our core selves, on our basic beliefs or life perspective.
Now home, I can say without a doubt that my trip to Costa Rica wound up being a very meaningful journey of self discovery and friendship. Those friends who experienced the trip alongside me will probably read this and chuckle, wondering how I got so much meaning out of the same group activities that they did. But that’s kind of exactly the point. It’s damn near impossible to explain to someone other than myself that I learned more about the kind of person I want to be while exploring volcanic beach rock with friends in a two piece athleisure outfit. No one else could know that no matter my size, the idea of wandering around in a bathing suit has been terrifying my whole life. Some of that terror was self-inflicted and some was applied to me by the outside world. Either way, I’m done with it. I shall explore, soak up the sun and be merry.In spandex.
It’s impossible to really communicate to someone outside my brain that hanging from steel cables, rappelling, rock climbing, hiking and white water tubing sort of changed my life. No one else could know that some silent voice inside has squashed my inner adrenaline junkie for so long that I didn’t even know what it sounded like. No one else could know that I’ve been so distant from adventure that I didn’t even know whether I would be scared until I was actually scared. Standing on a platform three hundred feet above the jungle floor, my palms sweating, hands shaking and heart pounding, it was obvious this was no Oprah moment, I was legitimately scared of sliding almost 30 meters with nothing between me and the trees except a wedgie-granting harness.
It’s impossible to explain how the crash of saltwater on your face swimming a half mile against ocean tides to a foreign shore, knowing you are strong and fit to do it invalidates any ounce of self doubt you might have lingering inside or outside of you. Or to communicate that watching the beauty of beach art being made in front of your eyes based solely on the feeding industry of a single tiny crab makes you feel like surely you could do anything you put your mind to. No one could know that seeing and doing all this while celebrating the love of true friends and making new ones creates an absolute craving for only healthy, vibrant, nurturing, passionate relationships in family, in bed and in the office from now on. And it seems nothing else will do.
Maybe it seems dramatic that a trip could have these effects. And that’s true. A trip didn’t have these effects. The activities themselves, the destinations would have been just a vacation if I weren’t ready to engage life in a new way now. If I weren’t looking for adventure, adventure wouldn’t appear. If I weren’t seeking new ways to be myself and to think of myself, I wouldn’t find them in quasi ordinary events. If I weren’t open to the kinds of people who are also seeking passion, health and meaningful experiences, I wouldn’t find them.
What Now
My dear, now wedded friends, may indeed still chuckle at this pronouncement. But I don’t mind them knowing that participating in their day kicked off a new chapter in my own life, which has been in the making for the better part of 2016. This year I’ve been on a mission to tackle some of the big, progress-interrupting issues in my life and as a result connected with an estranged family member, made major career shifts and strides and re-focused my efforts on getting healthy and happy. And I’ve got no plan to stop. More adventure, more health, more love and friendship, more depth in my experiences wherever they occur is what I’m after.
The doing of this hasn’t been and won’t be easy all the time. Sometimes these efforts came with sadness, pain and fear, but I can say without hesitation that I feel more joy and peace and hopefulness than ever before as a result. While my friends’ wedding trip didn’t initiate these changes, maybe it came to me at exactly the right time in my life. Maybe it was exactly the catalyst I needed to raise my self-improvement game to embrace new challenges and cast aside old habits or silly, negative thoughts that will help me continue to grow and get happier long after the vacation ended. They definitely didn’t get married in the jungle because of me, but I’m sure glad they did.