There was once a time when astrology fell under the "woo woo" category for me, and the idea of deciding anything, especially anything important because of it was not only irresponsible but worse than gambling. At least with gambling you have a chance, right? Even so I found myself looking to the night sky as a youth, looking for permission, for a sign. One that would let me know that what I was about to do would result in good things, instead of bad ones.
I remember standing in the middle of a deserted street in my home town many different times in life, asking the universe for a shooting star to literally sign off on my plans to alter destiny. Even then I didn't really think it was astrology or anything woo woo, just a crazy teen looking to see if creation was listening, that it cared. And If I didn't get my sign that night id come back another one, on a different street, hoping for the answer I wanted. Many times I'd choose to do nothing either way, sign or no sign, unable to trust or believe.
Fast forward two decades and I've now made what feels like the largest leap of faith yet, and all of it hinging on the celestial event that just happened this past Friday on February the 28th, when the planetary parade of 7 planets in alignment transpired. What was my decision and why did it require a sign from the heavens to make? Well, lets just say that the last time I looked to the sky for answers was more than a decade ago, and since then I've become so unrecognizable to myself that I need another shift just to pick up the pieces of my former life in ways that honor them, while also stepping fully into who I am now, and the man I want and need to become.
In order to do this I needed to step out and away from my life in California and go somewhere that not only interests me, but one that will challenge my abilities to the limit. For this reason I chose Japan, as I've been studying the language for 292 days straight, and as I've already gone into with the first episode, Japanese culture is part of my childhood.
The difficulty, as I would come to find out right away, would be high, not only logistically putting my life on hold, somehow finding the means to pay for it and getting friends and family to care take things in my stead, but in the many other obstacles I would have to overcome, fear and doubt back-dropping them all.
Just imagine, I find the time to go on this trip but it hast to be on the 12th of March, so I get everything in order and somehow that works out. Then I decide to buy my flight on the 28th during the alignment, my sign from the heavens, but I don't have the money… So I need to call in some favors. Then, low and behold my debit card expired the day before… So I scramble to buy the ticket via a work around involving a 7/11 and two cell phones, one with hotspot but no ability to connect to google apps, (my BraxOs phone) and one that can connect, but has no WiFi. Failing to transfer the money twice it finally works. Next I go home and choose the flights I want, and while typing in my passport number to Priceline.com, where I usually get my flights, I find that it too expired only three months before…
Now I'm really stressing, unsure of my sign and questioning my plan. Can so many things be telling me no, if they are really destined to work? Shaken but undeterred, I look into getting a new passport as soon as possible, but the only way to get it faster than three to four weeks, which would not work for me at all, is by already having a ticket abroad, one that leaves in less than 12 days from the time you have an appointment at the passport office in San Francisco. As you might have guessed, I bought the ticket.
To recap, I bought a plan ticket without money and with no valid passport, hinging my success on monstrous foreign bodies in space lining up above my head, heading for the most advanced first world country on Earth, a place even the Germans consider too straight lace and controlling, which is saying a lot.
So am I crazy? Is this a midlife crisis? I hardly think so, but if I am, and it is, will I have the stars to blame? No. I may have chosen the stars to guide me, but I chose long ago to own every decision I made, from the trivial to the cosmic and everything between. The only thing to do now, is follow through…