Postcard #4: Van Life Burnout: What No One Tells You About Full-Time Travel

When we first hit the road, we treated van life like a never-ending vacation - up for every sunrise, chasing every sunset, squeezing every ounce out of every day. But eventually, my body hit a wall. What started as a dream road trip turned into two months of running on empty… until a sharp pain in my chest forced everything to stop.

In this episode, I’m talking about the burnout no one prepares you for, how costochondritis became my very blunt wake-up call, and what slowing down has taught me about rest, presence, and letting go of FOMO, even when it feels like you’re missing out on everything. From van life realities to cultural whiplash in Baja, I’m unpacking the not-so-glamorous side of full-time travel and learning how to take care of myself along the way.

If you’ve ever struggled to rest, felt guilty for slowing down, or tried to outrun burnout, this one’s for you.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00: 0:00

Hello, hello. Welcome back to Postcards I Never Sent. I'm your host, Krista, and I'm currently somewhere in a van between Alaska and Argentina, both geographically and emotionally. This podcast is part travel diary, part spiraling, and mostly human AF. This is where I say all the things I never put into captions, the conversations I was too scared to have, and the thoughts I scribbled into notebooks that never made it to the mailbox. I'm just trying to make sense of it all and hopefully help you feel a little more seen in the process. Today's postcard is from From Baja, the land of tacos, endless coastline, and the slowest, chillest energy, I have tried and failed to match. In today's episode, we're gonna be discussing burnout, slowing down, and having major FOMO on the road. It's a real thing, I promise you. Thank you for tuning in, wherever you're tuning in from, whether it's on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or elsewhere. And a special thanks if you're from YouTube, because you can actually see me, and this is the first time I'm actually filming. me on camera doing this and i'm so not used to doing these long long long talking segments usually i'm filming travel videos sharing my adventures where i can actually think about like two or three sentences and then start recording myself filming it but this is a really really long thing so i have a ton of notes on my mac so that i can remember everything that i need to say so if i am looking down reading a little bit that's why Before we get into it, I'm gonna share some updates on where I'm at, what's been going on, and just some random things that's happened to me lately. And if you don't care, well, too bad. I'm gonna talk about it anyways. But I'll try to remember to put a timestamp in so you know exactly where to skip ahead to to get into the actual nitty-gritty of this podcast. I already have a feeling that this is gonna be a much longer podcast than the last three, so grab a drink and get cozy. And try to make sure it's one of those cute aesthetic drinks. This is mine. It's not very cute and aesthetic at this point, but yeah, it's my ice London fog. Okay, so I know I said that this podcast was a postcard from Baja, the land of tacos, endless coastlines, yada, yada, yada, but I'm actually in the mainland now, and I am so excited to be in the mainland. Baja was beautiful, absolutely stunning, amazing beaches, amazing culture, just a really, really nice vibe. but I was so stoked to come to mainland because I don't know, I could be wrong about this, but I feel like mainland Mexico is more authentic to the actual Mexican culture, but I could be totally wrong on that. So yeah, I'm just excited to be here because it's so different from Baja. There's just so much more here. Baja is all desert and beaches, beautiful and all. And there's some like mountains and stuff, but I'm so excited. to see trees again, like actual lush trees. I'm excited to see rainforests and jungle and more wildlife. So I'm super stoked to be in the mainland. We actually took the ferry, the TMC ferry to get here about a week ago now, maybe less than a week ago. about a week ago, and it was a pretty decent experience. It was really humid on the ferry, and very fumey, so it made it really, really hard to sleep. We got a pretty crappy sleep on the ferry ride over, but it was really cool. We saw some dolphins, we saw some sea turtles, and flying fish, and some other things, and the sunsets were really pretty. And I didn't get seasick, so that was great, and I'm about to sneeze. So we got to mainland, And we'd been told by some friends that got here before us, we were told by our friends Cora and Frankie and Mitchell and Chrissy that it's a lot more hot and humid here in Mazatlan. And well, we're an hour north of Mazatlan at this point, but we were expecting the humidity and heat to just be so, so bad. And we got here the first day, we were like, oh, it's, Not that much worse than what we were experiencing in La Paz and some other places in Baja. But then at night, the humidity gets to like 90% or even sometimes higher. I don't know if it was just the first week we were here, but it was insane. And we were so excited to be able to be parked somewhere and get a good night's rest after having a crappy sleep on the ferry. We did not get a good night's sleep. We had like five fans surrounding us. We're kind of in town, and so we couldn't keep the doors open because, you know, that's kind of sketchy in a town. But we have our overhead ceiling fan on, and we have these five little mini fans just running all night, and we're just like so clammy and sweaty, and it's so humid and gross. But It was a struggle. And that's one of the biggest struggles we have is not having an AC. So that was fun. And we were warned by my friend Chrissy, be prepared to be slapped in the face with humidity. When we first got here, we're like, eh, it's not that bad. It's the same. it's really not it's really humid and sticky here we've been working on a really big youtube video it will be out soon i really hope but it's our big pan-american usa and canada part of the adventure all in one big long video well actually we have to split into two parts otherwise it'd be like seven or eight hours long i think the first part is going to be like three and a half hours but i have to record voiceovers And unfortunately, doing this podcast, I have this teeny tiny little mic. You guys on YouTube can see it. But I'm in a room that's very echoey right now. And I feel like the audio quality is not going to be the greatest. So when I filmed my voiceovers and when I filmed my last podcast, I was in the van, you know, a little metal box with a bunch of flat surfaces, not much to absorb the echo, the sound bouncing off of stuff. So I'm in the van. in 100 degrees, well, about 100 degrees Fahrenheit, around almost 40 Celsius. And to help with sound absorption, I have my comforter over me, and the door's closed, the fan's off, so that there's no background noise. Like, I'm in this house here, and I have the AC off, so that I don't have as much background noise, and I can feel it slowly getting warmer. but it'll take a little longer. In the van, it's a different story. It gets so hot in there so fast. And so imagine, you know, it's like 40 something Celsius or no, not 40 something, 30 something Celsius, nearly 40, almost 100 degrees Fahrenheit. Doors are closed, you know, the heat is just like building up and getting so humid and I'm under a comforter recording voiceovers for 40 minutes. I was just like dripping in sweat by that point, so I'm really happy that we've taken this short break from van life to stay in a little house for four or five days and be able to have AC. It feels so good to be in a place where, you know, if we go for a walk outside, we can just come back in and we have AC and we can get cool. And we have a shower. We can shower every single day. It's great. And I was telling Will how I could totally live in a house this small. Like, I don't even know how to describe the size of this house, but there's one room right here that I'm in. And there's a tiny little kitchen. There's... Cable in the middle. And then there's a couch. There's nothing else here. And then there's an outdoor shower in one room. It's with a tiny bathroom. And then there's a bedroom that's like an okay size. And there's two double beds. And I'm like, this feels so great. But when you live in a van and you're in a small, tiny living space for so long, anything bigger than that feels so luxurious. And I've really been enjoying... swimming in the swimming pool. I grew up with a swimming pool and I used to basically be in it every day when I was a kid. So I've been enjoying that as well. And I'm not the type of girl that like sits by the pool with my goggle, I don't know, with my goggles. Sits by the pool in my swimsuit, laying on a little chair, getting a suntan. You know, I sometimes do that, but I'm the girl that's like, dude, hand me my goggles. I'm gonna go do some handstands. I'm gonna go swim underwater as long as I can, holding my breath, see how far I can go. It's so much more fun that way. Okay, okay, so... Now to the whole point of this episode. I swear this is going to be like two hours long. I apologize in advance for that, but I've got a lot to say. So one of the biggest lessons that I've been learning since starting van life is the importance of slowing down while living this lifestyle. It is so important because travel burnout is so real. Like nobody tells you that the burnout is so real. Everybody just basically shows the highlights of everything. But again, not everybody's traveling full time. So most people who are traveling full time don't really talk about this as much. Slowing down gives me major FOMO. But the thing is, is you will burn out and miss a heck of a lot more if you ignore the signals of your body telling you to slow down. And I've learned that the hard way. So let me explain. I've learned a few, I've learned that in a few different ways. So when Will and I first moved into the van, we were treating this like it was a long-term, one week vacation i don't know if that fully makes sense to you but you know when you plan a one or two week vacation and you just have every day jam-packed with all kinds of stuff to do you want to get up as early as possible you want to go on that hike you want to go see this place you want to go eat at this restaurant do this and that and like every day is just packed full and by the end of the one or two weeks you are just completely wiped Like you almost, it's almost like you go home after that and you need a vacation from the vacation that you just had. That's what it was like for us. We were up for every sunrise at 4 a.m. because the sunrise rises really early in Utah. And plus I had to get ready. I had to get fixed up so that I can be on camera and be in photos. And then we would be up for sunset, which is late at at least 10 p.m. And then by the time we find a spot to stay for the night, it's like 11 30 by the time you get wound down you do the last little things before you have to go to bed it's so late and then it ends up giving you like four hours of sleep and then i couldn't nap after that like after waking up in the morning for sunrise it was just impossible for me i can't do that especially in utah where it's super hot and Some days are excessively hot and it's super hot in the van. Once I wake up, my brain just can't shut off. And when I'm really hot, it's really hard to sleep. So it's not like I can catch up on sleep after a four hour night of sleeping. After several weeks, maybe a month of doing that, I really wanted to slow down. I really wanted to be able to sleep. but it was really hard for Will to accept that. It was really hard for him to accept that we can't live life on the road being up for every sunrise at 4 a.m. and every sunset at 10 p.m. and then just having like basically no sleep. You're never hitting that REM. You're never hitting the REM sleep. So you're never getting a good amount of rest. You're not waking up feeling rested and rejuvenated. You're just becoming like way overtired and so it was a lot of push and shove for a while it was a lot of disagreement and there was some arguments there was some pretty heated arguments for a while there but i got burnt out so quickly because of it because of it because i couldn't have the rest that i needed and it was so hard for him to accept the fact that that was not a sustainable way of traveling so yeah i got so burnt out so quickly um And I don't know if any of you have ever been burnt out, but what it looks like and feels like is constant exhaustion, even after sleeping. When you wake up and you still feel so tired, like you could sleep for 24 hours, but then sometimes you just can't. You can't sleep for that long. Some people can. Some people are like, yeah, I'll just crash out for 20 hours straight, but... If you're like me and you have a bunch of other shit going on, probably you're gonna have a hard time sleeping as much as you need. You start to feel emotionally numb or unmotivated even when you're in a beautiful place. You start to not even wanna be there. At least for me personally, there was a point where I was like, I don't even want to be here anymore. I just want to be home in my own bed. I just want to sleep forever. I don't care about the sunrise right now. I just want to sleep. That's how it felt for me. You start to get irritable or snapping over the smallest things when you're burnt out. And that's definitely something I dealt with quite a bit. You get brain fog, forgetfulness, or trouble focusing. There's so many times where I'm trying to look back at Utah or Arizona or something else and I'm like, Will, what did we do that day? Or he'll bring something up and he'll be like, oh, remember when this happened? And I'm like, I have no idea. I don't remember because by noon, my brain fog was just so insane that that I couldn't think or process anything. There would be times where he'd ask me a question and I'm like, I need like 10 minutes to process that. Like I can't process right now. Or he'll ask me, do you want this or this? And I'm like, you just choose please because I don't know, it's too hard. It just got really hard to even just make decisions. And you get a sense of dread when it's time to move again or plan something. Like, I don't know, it's really hard to heal. when your whole life is in motion. It's really hard to rest when your whole life is in motion. The only way to rest is just by like staying put and actively just trying to chill. You know, not like laying in bed, scrolling on your phone, like just actually chill. And when you're constantly on the go, like, okay, tomorrow we got to drive like two hours to go to another place. Like you ever just go on a road trip, you drive a couple of hours and you get back and you're just so tired. That's van life. And that is, is not good for your burnout um you also get a feeling like you're never doing enough no matter how much you do if you try to take a little break you're just like i need to be doing something i need to go i need to like be doing this hike it's yeah you always feel like you're never doing enough and then you start to get tension or pain in the body which We're going to get to that. But something I've been struggling with for a long time, I think I've been burned out for like years. But then when I started doing van life, the burnout just got more excessive because like I said, when your whole life is in motion, it's like almost impossible to heal. It's impossible to get the rest that you need. And so I have struggled with back pain and like shoulder and neck pain, shoulder and neck pain, and jaw tension. And it's like all the time, like my back is sore right now. It's like no matter what I do, I'm sore all the time. And I'm sure it's not just due to burnout. It's due to a bunch of other things that I'm dealing with, which I touched on in episode one, the anxiety, depression, hormonal imbalances, cortisol imbalances, all that kind of crap. That That all has to do with this as well. I mean, burnout triggers, we'll get into that after. But it also causes you to get sick more often. So you also heal more slowly. And so, okay, I'm gonna explain how that makes sense. So you ever just like when you're burned out already and then you get sick and you have a cold that lasts like an entire week and it just seems like it doesn't go away? That happens to me all the time. will came to quebec to build out the van where i live i live in quebec and he ended up bringing covid with him all he got was a little sniffle and of course i got it too and i'm out for an entire week just so sick so so sick and i'm locked up in my room because it's covered right and Yeah, for a whole week. And then I had lingering symptoms for a good three weeks. It was not fun. And it's like that every time I get a cold. Like Will had, like I said, he had the sniffles and it went away in a couple of days. But no, when I get sick, it lasts a long time. Another example, just before we started van life, I had an ingrown hair on my leg, like right there. I think you can see that if you're watching from YouTube. And it really hurt. So funny story. I go see Will with my ingrown hair. I didn't know what it was. And I showed Will and I was like, this really hurts. And he goes and pokes it. Like, ow. Like, it hurts so much. And I'm like, why would you go poke it? I just said it hurt. Like, genius. Anyways, so that was February-ish, 2024. So a year and a half ago. I still have a lingering bruise from that. It's still there. It's very faint, but I can see exactly where it was. I don't know if it's permanent. I don't know if it'll go away, but clearly it's taking a very long time to heal, if it'll ever actually go away. So when I started to feel the burnout, I kept telling myself that I needed rest. And I kept telling Will, I need rest. I need to sleep. I need to be able to just relax. Like, I don't want to get up for sunrise. I don't want to be up for sunset. I don't want a camera in my face. I just want to be able to chill and enjoy this place without having to do anything. Like I said, that was really, really hard for him to accept. And I mean, there was still a part of me that's like, I need to do like 20 hikes. I need to go on a hike today, but I need to rest. I need to do this. I need to do that. And I'd be like, oh my gosh, I need to rest. I really need to rest. I'm so tired. And then the other part of me is like, no, you gotta be doing more. You gotta go for a hike. You gotta go create some content. You know, there's like, my brain just would not shut up. Like it felt like if I rested, I wasn't doing enough. But if I went out and did something, Like, my internal world wasn't going to improve in any way. And it's really hard when you have two very, very conflicting emotions like that. And also having a lot of pressure from Will. And by the way, Will's great. I'm not trying to sound like I'm complaining about him. This was just one of the struggles we had in the beginning. And he's been so much better at it to the point now where if I'm like, I just need to sleep, he's like, okay, we're not doing anything today. That's totally fine. Take the rest you need. It's important. But back then, it wasn't like that at all. I'm his first girlfriend like ever. So one thing he had to learn was how to prioritize somebody over him, like not over himself, but prioritize what somebody else needs as well. and that's been a long long learning process for him but but it's getting there it's getting there it's been a lot better now um but that being said i totally get it when you're in a place that's as otherworldly and beautiful as utah i don't know if you guys have ever been there but utah is one of the most unique places in the us just the landscapes are all wildly different from Anything else, anywhere else. And even within Utah, everything is uniquely different to each other. And so it's really hard to be okay with missing a sunrise or sunset. But the thing is, is I just needed a break for like one night to be able to continue the next day. But when you're not allowed to have the break when you ask for it, you just get more and more tired. That tiredness builds up. The irritation builds up. and you just get more burnt out, like more and more burnt out. And when you lose that on sleep so much and don't get it when you really need it, your body really starts to keep score. The one thing I knew was that I needed rest and it went on for two months before we finally made our way to Arizona where we explored some slot canyons and some other unique landscapes. So Arizona is another really unique and special place. And after doing a couple of things at a RV park for the RV park, we were creating some content for them, I decided I wanted to go on an adventure and kayak into a slot canyon because I heard there was this secret entrance into Antelope Canyon. And Antelope Canyon is a really... popular, probably one of the most famous spots in Arizona, Arizona, Arizona, Slot Canyon wise. And this secret way until Antelope Canyon isn't super overtoured with thousands of people every day like Antelope Canyon is. Like my guide at Antelope Canyon told me that one of the Kardashians booked it out so that she could be in there by herself with like her family or something or some other people. I don't know if that story's true, but that's how busy it is. She actually had to rent it out and make sure that there was nobody else going to be there. So I was excited to go on a new and epic adventure. Because in Utah, we mostly would drive to a spot and then put up the drone. It was a lot of drone stuff. And I love the adventure. And so... We decided we were going to go kayak into Antelope Canyon. It's, I forget the distance, but it's a long kayak paddle and it's a decent length of a hike. So yeah, we did that. But the thing is, is that day I had this weird little pinpointed pain in my chest. I don't know what causes it, but it's been happening to me for years now. I don't know, I don't remember what ever caused it in the first place. But just out of nowhere, I'll get this pinpointed pain, basically in the center of my chest. And it's like a sharp pain, but it's not like super bad. Like if I like twist my shoulders and I move my arms up, I can feel it. Like I can feel it kind of pulling and being more sore when I move. But it would always go away in a couple of days. So I'm like, okay, it's not a big deal. It's back again, whatever. As it, you know, it does. It usually would go away, but it would happen like at least once a year, every year for like the last four years or whatever. And so, yeah, that was happening. And I was like, yeah, it'll go away. No big deal. So we made our way to the boat launch on Lake Powell in the early AM where, and we were on the water by around six. I could be wrong in those times, but it was pretty early. We wanted to go for around sunrise and I was finally stoked to go on the real adventure. And so we kayaked several kilometers that day. I don't remember the exact amount, but it was pretty far. And we hiked several hours in the Arizona heat. I also don't remember how many kilometers that was. And so it is a slot canyon. It's not quite as slotty as the lower and upper antelope canyons where you're kind of like weaving your way through and like, you know, turning to the side so that you can fit through a little like slot or whatever. And there are in this part of antelope canyon, there are some places where I'm using my upper body strength to like pull myself up. And also keep in mind that I had to use a lot of upper body strength for the kayaking for a long time. And so as we made our way further into the canyon, that tiny pinpointed spot started to hurt more and more. And I did this stupid thing of trying to like stretch it out. I'm like stretching as hard as I can, pulling my hands back, you know, like my chest actually cracks. I'm getting will to crack my back. I'm just like trying to stretch it out. I'm like, yeah, if I stretch it out, this little knot will go away. Well, it's not a knot. It's not in my muscle. I'm not going to stretch it out, apparently, as I found out later. But yeah, that was a really stupid thing to do. And it just got more and more irritated. So by the time we got back to the kayaks, I told Will, like, this is starting to really hurt, but I was still able to kayak. It wasn't so sore that I wasn't able to kayak, but I was like, I do not want to be kayaking with this pain, but it was okay enough that I was still able to go. On the way back, the waves were bigger, and as we paddled, I can just feel the pain getting worse and worse, and I'm like, this really can't be good. I was starting to worry more and more, but thankfully I was still able to paddle. When we got back to the van, and as soon as we did, the pain doubled. It worsened so much. so we went and found our spot for the night my brain's kind of like foggy on what exactly happened after we kayaked i want to say we went and got food but i couldn't be wrong but at some point we made our way and found a spot for the night and the next morning when i woke up i was in probably the worst pain i'd ever been in i had shingles before i had it on my forehead that's why i have this gnarly scar that i tell people is like a a lightning bolt And this one guy actually, this one time I actually told this guy that I was attacked by a bear. He believed me for a minute, but I told him after that it was shingles. And he's like, oh, like shingles fell off the roof and hit you in the head. I'm like, no, like the chicken pox thing. And he's like, oh, but yeah, shingles really hurts. I don't know if any of you have ever had shingles, but it hurts so much, so much. But I don't know, I feel like costochondritis hurts more. But yeah, I could not pull myself up out of bed. The pain was so bad. Will had to help me get up carefully. He actually had to hold my back, hold my neck, and sit me up. And I couldn't put my arms up. I couldn't even hold a cup of water because it hurts so much. Will tried to give me a cup of water. He did everything for me when I was going through this pain because I couldn't, like I said, I couldn't even hold a cup of water. My drink right now, this would hurt way too much to be able to hold. And I'm gonna take a sip now because it's so good. But yeah, he did everything around the van. Basically did all the cooking. My camera died, so I have to go reset it back up. Hopefully it's in focus. I promise that wasn't a fart. But yeah, what I mean by he basically did all the cooking is that he did do all the cooking. He did all the cleaning. He made sure I was comfortable, got water, went and did groceries. Everything. It was just too hard for me to move. It was so painful. And I don't know, like some people can be like overdramatic about their pain, but for this, I definitely wasn't being dramatic about it. Some people get this pain worse than others. And I seem to have gotten it really bad. Like breathing hurt. Sneezing hurt even more. It was so painful. Sneezing hurt so much. And when I would finally get up and Will would help me out of the van, whatever, walking hurt. Every single step. You know, there's a little bit of a bounce in steps. So every little step, it was like, ugh, ugh. Like, it just hurt so much. And I don't think Will realized how much pain I was actually in for a while, at least not for the first week that I suffered from this, but he helped, he still helped me and did everything around the van. I think he finally realized how bad it was when, you know, it'd been a little while and I was getting out of the van and I hit my head on the shelf getting out. Like I went to get out and then I realized I forgot something. and I'm really stiff and stuff and I get up and I hit my head on the little shelf and I just start screaming and crying. I'm like, I'm so fucking sick of this. I never wanna feel this pain again. It hurts so much. I'm just over at the bed with my head down, crying and bawling my eyes out and I think that might've been the moment where he realized, oh, she's actually really in pain. She's not just milking this. Like this actually really hurts. And we did some looking one of the first days that I had it to see what it could be, like what the heck could possibly be wrong with me because surely it wasn't a heart attack or a stroke because it definitely wouldn't last that long and it wouldn't be like a slight pain that slowly, slowly, slowly gets worse, you know? Okay, so camera died again. It didn't die, it just powered off. Apparently it's been overheating, and so I decided to close the curtain, turn on the AC, and let it cool off a little bit. I closed the curtain just enough so that it blocks the camera from sunlight, which I think is what was really triggering it to overheat, so we're back in business. And I'm really warm. It's getting really warm in here because the AC's off again. It just creates so much background noise, so. Gotta do what you gotta do. I'll just go jump in the pool after. So, like I said, we... I don't even know where I was. So, we did some looking into what the heck could be wrong with me. Okay, I already mentioned the heart attack thing and the stroke and how it can't be that because they probably don't last too long. But yeah, I thought something was seriously wrong with me. I honestly... thought that maybe it could be something fatal or maybe I had like a broken rib or something but I was like how could I have a broken rib like I didn't really do anything that extreme to be able to hurt myself that bad so after a lot a lot of research we determined that it was most likely costochondritis and just so you know I don't recommend self-diagnosing if you think that something's wrong with you go see a professional seriously like don't learn from me Do not learn from me. Highly, highly do not recommend. So we ended up making our way to the California coast so we could be somewhere that was a little bit more cool with some breeze because we were currently in Nevada by that point and then in Alabama Hills and it was just too hot and too uncomfortable to be able to rest properly. I don't like being sweaty and sticky and being in Nevada. or Alabama Hills that time of year meant that I was gonna be pretty sticky and sweaty. And like, as a Canadian, I get really hot easily. I don't know, maybe it's partially my hormonal imbalances and cortisol imbalances, but I'm gonna blame part of it on being Canadian. When I'm somewhere that's hot, it's excessively hot for me and I sweat. way too easily. And the coast was just so much cooler and so much more comfortable and allowed me to be able to rest a lot better but of course my costo kept flaring up full force so we looked into more different ways to help i started taking some painkillers i was using this roll-on muscle coolant or muscle relaxant stuff i was taking is it called doms dons i don't know i forget what it's called but yeah some kind of like pill that's specifically for um relaxing your muscles and stuff and i bought a a few different types of supplements that I thought would help. And eventually we came across the back pod while watching some YouTube videos. And this person was struggling with costochondritis for years and years and years, and it would just not go away. And you know, I'm in the midst of it and I'm like, oh my God, my life is going to be ruined. I'm never going to be able to go backpacking again. Like I'm going to suffer from costochondritis for the rest of my life. It's going to be a constant on and off pain. I'm like freaking out. Like, of course I don't want that. That's like going to change my life. so much and in ways that I don't want it to change and so yeah we discovered the back pod through a YouTube video and this person was like ever since I've had the back pod my costochondritis hasn't been flaring up and I've been kind of okay like It's basically healed my cost of contritis, and if I feel it coming back on, I just use the back pod again. So I'm like, you know what? I'm going to spend$80, spend my pretty pennies on this back pod thing. It's this weird, like, green, oval-shaped, like, dome-shaped thing that you, like, lay on the ground, and you lay on it, and you place it in the middle of your back, and you just kind of, like, lay there. I think you lift your arm. It's been a while since I've used it. So you, like, lift your arms up over your head, and you just, like... relax and let it basically like stretch out your ribs. So essentially, costochondritis is your ribs kind of, like I don't know the full terms for it, like I don't know the scientific shit for it, but it's basically like your ribs kind of like tighten up. Yeah, that's the best way I can explain it. If you want to know what costochondritis is, go look it up, because I suck at explaining it. But yeah, so I got that, spent my pretty pennies on it, and used that for a few weeks. And yeah, it went away after a couple of weeks of using it. And it never came back. Up until, so it's been like a year now since I had costochondritis. It was like, I believe it was in April that I got it. May? Maybe May. And this May, like last month, I had that pain in my chest and I did the stupid thing of stretching it out and I felt it getting worse and worse and I looked at Will and I was like, I'm about to get full-blown costochondritis again. And I was so disappointed by that. I so did not want to have full-blown costochondritis again. It was not something that I wanted. I'm covering my feet because my toenails are not very beautiful right now, so I'm kind of gross and gnarly. But yeah, so... I just felt it coming on and it got worse and worse and I was stupid by stretching it out as hard as I could. So of course it gets really painful again, but it didn't get nearly as painful as it did last time and it went away after a couple of days without really having to do anything because I was like, I need a few days to rest and Will's like, okay, we're just going to take it easy for a few days. I was like, okay, good. And it went away in a few days. So other than that, it hasn't come back full blown to the point where I can't hold a cup or I can't do anything. But every now and then I do get that little sharp pain in my chest, that pinpointed pain, and I just kind of take it easy and let it be, make sure that it goes away because I'm so terrified to get costo again. And you know, I think getting costochondritis by that point was my body's way of saying like, okay, so you're not gonna slow down. Well, here you fucking go. Here's a little pinpointed pain in the middle of your chest. Go ahead and push yourself. Let your boyfriend push you too. See what happens. So of course I go kayaking and then boom, my body's like, huh, now you have to slow down. I'm pretty sure it was literally my body keeping score and being like, okay, she's not going to slow down. Her boyfriend's not going to let her slow down and she's not stepping up enough to fight for that. Well, I kind of was fighting for it. But here you go. Now you have to rest because You literally can't do anything. And I'm also gonna scare the shit out of you and make you feel like you might die. Like it was so scary. I thought something was seriously, seriously wrong with me. I mean, in that amount of pain and in that area of your body, you really do worry about it. Slowing down was hard though. Slowing down, like traveling slowly was something I knew I wanted to do when I first started this. But when you get into it, it's kind of hard to, Accept that you need to slow down because there's so much to see in this beautiful world. There's so much in every place and You don't want to miss it, right? and so I just always felt like I was missing out on so much by slowing down So it was really hard to accept that and be like, okay, i'm gonna slow down today but the thing is is When you get burnt out or you're forced to slow down You're missing out on more than you would have if you just let yourself slow down and rest. And because of this, because of costochondritis forcing me to slow down, I felt like I was missing out on so much. I couldn't do much in California and Washington, two states that I wanted to explore so much. I'd been to Washington before, but only spent a week there. And then I'd been to California before, but I only went to my friend's wedding and just kind of hung out with her. at her apartment, I think. And so I didn't really get to explore California. So I was so stoked going into this trip for the West Coast. Of course I was excited for Utah, but I love the mountains so much. And Washington was one of those places where I'm like, this is where I need to be. I love this place, I love the mountains. And now that I was there, burnt out and forced to slow down by costochondritis, it forced me to miss out on so much. I couldn't do much there and slowing down had become a priority. So I missed out on several things since then because of the fear of doing it, such as like backpacking. When I went on my first backpacking trip in Washington, Will carried literally 80% of the weight because we were scared that out in the back country, the costochondritis would flare up and he'd have to carry absolutely everything and then come back for me and help me. Because that's how bad it would have been. Like, I was so terrified. But we went and did that one hike anyways. And it stopped me from doing a lot of other backpacking for a long time. And I love backpacking. I hate carrying the weight. I hate climbing up steep ass hills, but I love being in the backcountry. And You know, being stuck out there with costochondritis isn't really exactly a great situation to be in. And so a few months after moving more slowly, we ended up in the Yukon where we would go from like, we kind of like travel in spurts. So we'd move really quickly for a couple of weeks and then kind of go slow for a week or so. And honestly, that is still really hard on the body because like you're pushing for two weeks straight. And then, of course, you need a week to rest. And eventually, we made it up to Alaska, where we started pushing hard again because it was autumn. And, you know, in Alaska, the fall season is very short. It goes by so quickly. And, you know, it's so beautiful. So, of course, you want to see all the places during the fall. So we're doing everything in the autumn. We're going hard. We're going fast. We're recording everything. At this point, we're actually doing YouTube, so we're filming videos in every place we're at. I have a camera in my face all the time. We're up for sunrises, sunsets, you name it. We're just moving nonstop. And then, you know, there's times where we're having little breaks, but we're still burnt out from it. Plus, we're cooped up in the van by winter because it's just so cold outside that we don't really want to go out, but we want to see the beauty. And so we're pushing hard again in the winter because we're trying to get the last little bit of our adventures up there. Like, you know, time is fleeting for us. We only have so much time left before we head south. Like, we get to see as much of this place in winter as possible. So again, moving fairly quickly, plus being in the van, plus doing a bunch of work, editing, all that kind of stuff. It was just crazy. And the pace we were moving at in the beginning was... too much and too exhausting like i said i got burnt out so fast and we needed to learn that this was a lifestyle not a never-ending one-week vacation where you try to fit in as much as you can every single day after trips like that you come home and you just feel exhausted this was not a one-week trip This was a lifestyle. This was everything, you know. And like I said, I knew that from the start that I wanted to travel slow. But it was so hard to convince Will that it was important to move slowly and to take our time. And it hit me a hell of a lot harder than it hit him. And I think that has a lot to do with the anxiety, depression, hormonal imbalances, all that kind of stuff. and everything else going on internally. I was crashing and burning every single day. I had brain fog by noon. I would wake up feeling tired. I'd be up in the middle of the night needing to pee. I would struggle to sleep for like three hours. I was incredibly irritable amongst a billion other symptoms of burnout and everything else I listed, the anxiety, hormones, whatever. And so at the end of Alaska, we went home for the holidays for two and a half months and got to rest a lot, got to recoup. I got my shit together and in my last, not in my last podcast, but in episode one, I talked about all the things I did to get better and to get into balance before we met back up on the road and And we spent, when we met back up on the road, we spent a month or so in the Eastern Sierras area. And we didn't really move much. And, you know, it was nice to just be in one spot for a prolonged period of time and not feel like I was gonna burn out. After that, we hit the road to Baja. And by then, I'm feeling pretty good. I'm feeling like, you know, I'm not waking up in the middle of the night anymore. I'm a little less irritable. I, like my brain fog is kind of going away. Like I feel like 50, not 50% better, maybe like 35% better. And so when we got to Baja, when we crossed the border to Baja, I was like ready to go. I'm like, yeah, new place, new country. I'm ready to see all the things. We started to get our route mapped out. I had all these video ideas lined up. I had all these like photos lined up, reels planned. I was ready to hit every beach and capture sunrises and hike all the trails and finally get my content to perform on Instagram. Instagram. Spoiler alert. It never performed after. It's still struggling, but you know what it is what it is. But yeah, we got to Baja, and I'm like, yeah, ready to go. I'm going to see all the things, do all the things, do all the hikes. I'm feeling great. I'm feeling better than I was before. It's time to do this. But Baja was like, nah, that's not going to happen. Yeah, we get to places. Service isn't the greatest. In towns, everything just feels... so much slower except for the people driving the people are speedy and you know there's just locals sitting around not rushing doing whatever there's just dogs napping in the middle of the road not giving a care if you're driving by it just felt like everything in baja was like yo you need to like slow down and chill like remember what happened before well this place is going to teach you a lesson too But I was feeling antsy. I was so excited to be in a new place. I'm like, this place is new, this is different, there's beaches. And we only have six months in Mexico, so we gotta see as much as we can. It's a big country, of course. Of course that's gonna be my mindset. And I think life in Baja is a lot slower, partially, or in Mexico also, partially because of the heat. Everything just needs to be done slower in the heat. Everything just works a little more slowly. Like, you do something, like you go for a walk in the heat, you want to walk slow, otherwise you're going to be dripping in sweat. At least I will be. And that's not fun. I don't like being sweaty. And, you know, so I resisted the slower-paced lifestyle that I was seeing in the beginning. And, you know, I was still checking for signals, still wanting to get up for every sunrise and sunset. I kept trying to... you know, narrate the moment instead of just kind of being in it. Like the voice inside my head was loud. It was like, okay, you only got so much time here. You're going to go on 20 hikes a day. It's exaggerative. You're going to go on 20 hikes a day. You have to put the drone up every day. You have to take pictures every morning. You got to get pictures every single day. Take pictures of every place you go to. You know, it was like, there's a lot of pressure. like you should be doing more don't waste this time don't waste this opportunity rest who needs that and it's that damn inner critic i told you about in episode number three postcard number three i swear i can see my inner critic just like standing there and she's like she's got this like black blazer on with a white tank underneath and she's got these like black dress pants she's got her hair slicked back in a little ponytail she's got her little glasses on the end of her nose she's got red lipstick and she's holding her little clipboard she's got a pen in her hand she's tapping it on the clipboard while tapping her foot on the floor just looking at me taking notes and reading things off of her list of all these things that i need to do and all these things that she's critiquing me about god she's just i could i could just see her there she needs to like take a step back so Will and I both come from North America, so Canada and the US. I know Mexico is part of North America, but I come from Canada and Will comes from the US. And I'm sure a lot of you guys listening out there are also from either of those countries. I know there's some listeners from other places in the world, which is so cool. But here in North America, aside from Greenland and Mexico, It's such a busy culture. Busyness equals value. Everyone's so used to rushing and getting to the next thing and scheduling and planning every moment of every day. And even on rest days, it's not a very chill culture. We don't really do chill. It's such a hustle culture. And we kind of arrived in Baja expecting to keep that same pace. But it's so different. You know, things are closed midday. Like, we'd go into town and we'd look at Google Maps to see what restaurants are open and where we can go, but then we'll drive around and everything's actually closed. It's like, what? Like, you're supposed to be open right now. What are you doing? Like, it's just so different. Like, people just aren't in a hurry. And... You know, sometimes it's just like we go to a restaurant and it's closed and it's like, well, now what? Like, this place is supposed to be open. That would rarely ever happen in Canada or the U.S. And I mean, there's nothing wrong with that, but it's just not what we were expecting at all. And, you know, seeing this, like, I started questioning, like, why is it that I feel so anxious that I'm doing nothing? Like, if I take some time to just rest or just chill and do nothing, I feel like I'm wasting so much time because of the hustle culture of Canada and the US. It really makes you always feel like you're not doing enough if you rest. Or you'll go out to the beach on a Wednesday and it'll just be packed with locals. And it's like, what are you doing here? Don't you got to be somewhere? Don't you got to be doing something? You know, like, and I guess like any place you go, like there's people that just take a day off to go to the beach or whatever. But it just seemed like it was just more than usual, more than I'd like seen before. Baja has showed me that rest can be part of the experience. And it's not a pause from it. Like, I don't know about you, but the best I feel when I'm traveling is is when I can just go to a spot and fully enjoy the moment and not do anything. If I'm on the beach just sitting there and watching the sunset, I feel so at peace. I feel so happy to be there. And I don't need anything else in that moment. I don't need to be doing anything. That is the one time that my brain just goes completely silent. And it's the same with all the other elements. If I just sit in a forest by a river, I just feel so at peace. I feel so grounded. I feel amazing. If I'm sitting around a campfire and there's only a few people and you know like we're having conversations and stuff but there's some moments where it's just like everyone's just kind of thinking of what to say well I just like stare at the fire and I just zone right out and my mind is completely blank and that like never happens. My mind is always like chaos inside but when I'm just sitting there fully in the moment looking at where I am and feeling it, feeling the elements around me, like I feel so grounded and so at peace. Baha has also showed me that productivity addiction runs deep and it sneaks into van life too. You always feel like you need to be doing something. You always feel like you need to be productive, especially as a creator. Like I always feel like I need to be filming something or taking photos or editing something, but You know, the productivity addiction is hard to let go of, and it's hard to feel okay not doing anything. Baha has taught me that slowness isn't laziness. It's wisdom and it's trust. When you can slow down and allow yourself to really just be in the moment, your mind goes a little bit more clear, and it allows you to find more clarity in situations. It's also taught me that some days are for naps, for oceans and goggles, and not feeling guilty about it. If you're on the road and you have a lot of work to do, you still need to take a break, you still need to go out and enjoy the beach, enjoy where you're at, put your goggles on, go snorkeling, do whatever, just enjoy where you are without feeling the pressure to Document it for other people like do it for you do it for yourself I've started to enjoy mornings with no agenda and Evenings with no content plan. Okay, that's kind of a lie No agenda as in like, okay We're gonna get up at 6 tomorrow to be ready by 6 20 so that we can go out and get sunrise and take photos it's more of a Okay, I'm just going to wake up when I wake up and then I'm going to do my morning routine, which is an agenda, but it's something that's helping me. And I don't let myself feel pressured if I wake up in the morning and I'm like, okay, I've done this, this, this, and this off of my daily list of things to do on my morning routine. I don't feel like doing this, this, and this, so... Maybe I'll switch it up tomorrow and do those tomorrow and skip these things tomorrow. You know, like, I don't put too much pressure on myself to get it all done. But I don't have the agenda of, you know, we got to be at a place at a certain time and do this and that. Like, there's mornings where it's just, we'll wake up when we wake up, and that's fine. And I've also learned to listen when my body says no. Even if the beach looked tempting... where the plan was exciting. If my body is not feeling it, probably not a good idea to do it. And yeah, so if I start getting that chest pain now, I know that I need to rest and relax and not push myself too hard. Don't do stupid stretches, Krista. Don't do stupid stretches when you feel that pain because it always brings costochondritis back. You discovered that last month. Baha doesn't rush, and eventually if you stay long enough, it starts to wear you down in a good way. You know, I started to drink my tea slower. I've started to just slow down my mornings and take my time with my morning routine, doing things that are going to help me in the long run, that are going to allow me to rest and quiet my mind. And You know, it's taking more time for healing and watching a sunset without the pressure of creating content and leaving the camera in the van. And in doing that, nothing fell apart. Nothing fell apart. Of course, there's still a lot of pressure to get stuff done because, you know, this is my life. I do need to put content out there because that's how I'm going to make my income. But it's still important to rest. It's still important to enjoy the moment, be in the moment, and have these experiences. What Baha taught me is that slowing down isn't laziness. It's a choice. And it's a priority shift. It's knowing that life is more than the next goal, the next email, the next content plan, perfect shot, whatever it may be. Days that have... No agenda, but watching the light change, feeling and being fully in those moments. I used to think that I had to earn rest, that I had to accomplish something in order to be able to do nothing. But here, doing nothing is something. It's its own vibe. And it's not a break from life. It is life. It's all a part of life. You literally need rest to feel good in life. I think part of the reason why it's so hard to slow down is so much of our worth is tied to output, especially as a content creator. If I'm not posting, I'm not growing. And if I'm not growing, I'm not getting any reach. And if I'm not posting, and I'm not getting any reach, and I'm not growing, it's harder to make money. And that's a very real thing. And sometimes it just feels like I'm falling behind. But then I look around, and I realize that most peaceful people I've seen in Baja, they don't even have a phone. They don't have a phone in their hands, and they're not branding their entire life. They're just living their life. They're living it fully. They're not recording every single moment. They're not taking pictures of every single thing. Sometimes they just don't even have a phone. And I love documenting my life. I love taking pictures. But some of it just feels too curated to the point where it has caused that burnout. It has caused a lot of frustrations. And I want to be able to live life fully. And slowing down to reduce burnout and to prevent burnout. In doing that, it doesn't mean you have to stop dreaming. It just means you need to take a damn breath between all the dreams. But of course, with all of that, even though slowing down is so important because burnout fucking sucks, with that comes major FOMO. major, major FOMO on the road, I feel so much fear of missing out on so many different things. And I saw that when I was in Washington and I couldn't do anything and I couldn't go backpacking. You know, I already told you about that. I'm not going to go into detail about that again, but I mean, yes, we're traveling full time, but everything in the van takes so much longer. So The dishes take longer. We don't have hot running water. You ever try to wash oily dishes with cold water? It's not that fun. It makes things take so much longer. Doing laundry. A lot of times when we decide, okay, through this town, we're going to do laundry. It takes us time to find a good laundromat. And then we have to go and actually do the laundry. Cleaning. Cleaning takes longer. I can't tell you how many times a day we have to sweep the van because we're trekking in sand all the time. And then it gets... all over the bed which is the worst part and I hate having sand on the floor and like I'm stepping in it I don't it overstimulates me I hate it so much and every night when I go to bed there's like sand under me and I can feel it like scratching me I'm like okay I gotta get this off the bed so I like sit up on my hands and knees on the bed and I'm like a dog trying to like dig a hole in the ground but I'm wiping all the sand off the bed um and then there's you know, finding things, like water. It'll take us a while to drive across town and find some water, or look for a cheap restaurant to go eat at and find tacos, and then we have to go drive to that location, and we have to park, and then we have to go walk to it, and... um then there's the working situation sometimes we want to go to a starbucks because we have no ac in the van so then we have to drive 20 minutes to a starbucks and then we have to go in and we have to set up and then in the van if we want to work it's not as comfortable we have to unpack everything set it all up plug everything in and then when we move locations we have to pack it all up put it in a safe place so it doesn't break And then it gets so hot and so humid in the van. I already went through that earlier in this episode. And, you know, we have lots of editing to do to get YouTube videos out. We have photos to edit, which takes tons of time from adventuring. But we love it. We love doing this. We love sharing content. And I love that I started this podcast. I mean, this might be a two-hour long podcast, and I'm sitting here doing this when I could be out enjoying the pool, but... enjoying this i love it i feel like it's something i'm really called to do so i still want to do it but it does take so much time and you know passing through a town ends up taking a full day it's not just like okay we're gonna make a quick stop at the grocery store no it takes forever it turns into a whole day thing we gotta go do groceries gotta drive to the grocery store and then we have to drive to find water and then we have to drive to go find other things that literally turns into a full day thing Then there's driving from location to location You know when we move to a new destination, you know, sometimes it's a three-hour driving day Sometimes it's only an hour. Sometimes it's less but more often than not it does take a long time and then when you're moving every day you have to pack everything up put everything in a safe space and Get ready to hit the road and sometimes that even takes half an hour to get ready and do so There's a lot of things in van life that take up a lot of time. And when you combine that and needing to rest from your travels and not do too much and slowing down, you lose a lot of time to actually do all the adventures you want to do. And you know, van life is great. I love it. I do not want to trade this lifestyle. And I'm not trying to sound like I'm complaining. I do love it. And there's so much amazing things that come with it. Like waking up in a new spot every day, trying new foods, immersing myself in new cultures, meeting new people, making new friends like Cora and Frankie, Mitchell and Chrissy. Like they're some of the coolest people I've ever met. And I'm so glad that I met them. We even went off plan. to see a lot of places because we ended up spending time with them and you know that took away from actual adventuring but it was so worth it because we had so much fun with them but when you add all that up it does take away from the adventure and seeing the new places and there's this invisible side of van life that you don't really see and there's so much pressure to make every day worthy of this lifestyle and there's so many times where you know we're going through a struggle and i feel like i don't have the right to complain because i am living a dream a lot of people want to live but there's so many struggles that come with it but i also feel like i can't complain i don't have the right to complain because i did choose this life and you know van life isn't just freedom There's a lot of decision making. It's constant decision making. Like, what are we going to eat for dinner? What kind of groceries do we need to get? Can we fit that in the fridge? Do we have space for this? Should we buy this? Do we have space for this? Can we afford this? Can we afford that? Where should we sleep tonight? Is this a safe spot to sleep? And then you drive to that place and you're like, eh, I don't really feel too great about this place. And then you have to decide where to go after that. There's so much decision-making that comes with it. So much planning, logistics, and unpredictability that comes with this lifestyle. And it does make it tough. And it may seem like we get to explore and do this and that every single day, but in reality, a lot of days we're just kind of like chilling in a coffee shop or in the van, getting some editing done. And sometimes spiraling on the beach. I've had that happen a few times, and yeah. It's not exactly how I want to be spending my time, but sometimes it happens. Sometimes there's just a trigger, and I'm just out for the whole day. But like I said, don't get me wrong. There's a lot of struggles, but there's so many great things great things that come with van life i feel so lucky to be able to live this lifestyle that so many people dream of doing there's so much good stuff that comes with it it all completely outweighs the bad stuff but today we're talking about burnout and slowing down and how that increases major fomo so back to the major fomo i've had to accept that with slowing down That means I don't get to see everything I want to see. And that's been really hard for me to accept. I want to see so much of every place I visit. I want to be able to say, I've been there. I've seen that country. You know, I've been to Jamaica, but I went to a resort. Did I really see Jamaica? Did I really have an authentic Jamaican experience? No. No, I didn't. And no shame in anyone that loves resorts. That's fine. That's your vibe. You're chilling. That's great and all, resorts can be fun, but I wanna immerse myself in culture, try authentic food, get lost in a city, meet locals learn about their hidden gems learn about their culture like everything i want to have all those experiences i want to go to local markets i want to see all the beautiful landscapes i don't want to just go to a resort eat at a buffet and sit on a beach like i said no shame in anyone who loves that that's totally fine and because this is a lifestyle and we only get so much time exploring each country that means a lot of time gets put into doing all of these everyday tasks that need to be done and that creates less time exploring and don't get me wrong like exploring every day is very exhausting i've discussed that a few times already you also get major FOMO because you're missing out on seeing really cool places like you know i missed out on seeing a really cool waterfall swimming hole in baja and other beautiful beaches or exploring cute towns. And you kind of have to learn to accept that over time. And I think I've gotten better at that. By the time it got to the point where we were going to go deciding whether or not to visit the swimming hole or not, I was like, you know what? I think I finally accepted the fact that we're not going to see everything I want to see. And that was one of the things I really wanted to do. And it was really high on my list to do in Baja, but we passed over it anyways. And I think I'm starting to learn that it's okay. And the FOMO is like, it is really real. Like you start to feel guilty for skipping must-see destinations or experiences or comparing your travels to other people who are also traveling. Oh, they did this and did that. And I didn't get to do that thing. They seem to get to do it all. But what we need to know or realize is people who are doing short-term travels, they are not seeing it all. And people who are traveling full-time are also not seeing it and doing it all. But we get this pressure to capture and share everything. And it leads to performance over presence, which, you know, isn't a good thing. Like, I want to live and feel in the moment. And... Yeah, it's just a lot of struggling to accept that you can't see everything. And feeling like you're wasting the experience instead of constantly exploring. And you feel like you should be constantly exploring. And when you're missing a waterfall, it feels like you're missing the waterfall. Like, you almost feel like you need to be there. It's really hard to let go of. But like I said, I've been getting better at that day by day. And it's just a really weird paradox of craving the stillness and slowing down and also feeling like you're just falling behind. It's a lot of like, yeah, it's a lot of paradox stuff going on there. But the travel burnout is real though. And if you push yourself too hard, it just won't be fun anymore. And this doesn't just apply to van life. It applies to every other part of life, no matter what you're doing, what your job is. If you're pushing yourself too hard, you're gonna end up feeling like crap. And you're gonna end up feeling forced to slow down, forced to rest, and it's just so important to take care of yourself. You gotta listen to your body. Know when you're starting to feel tired and just learning to rest. So let's talk a little bit about what happens when you don't listen to your body. So your nervous system stays in fight or flight even in relaxing environments. Have you ever gone somewhere and you're just like, you're so burnt out, you're so tired, and you go somewhere to relax, but all you can think is like, oh, I should be doing more, I should be doing this, I should be doing that, I need to go do this, I need to make this phone call, I need to answer this message. It's just so hard to relax at that point. You get increased cortisol, which leads to hormonal imbalances. and digestive issues and sleep disruptions. And I touch on all of that in episode one, postcard number one, because all of that is stuff that I've experienced. The burnout highly, highly increased the hormonal imbalances and my cortisol. It was not fun. You also process and integrate experiences, dream rest, not while in motion you cannot rest fully when your whole life is in motion you're in this little metal box traveling the world like literally your life is movement you can't rest properly and heal when you're in a box so if you don't take time to slow down if you're on the road you probably will get burnt out so When you don't listen to your body, it leads to chronic stress, which also increases inflammation in the body, which worsens anxiety and depression and physical pain. I already told you about the physical pain, my back, my neck, my shoulders, my jaw. I got costochondritis. I had that ingrown hair that I still have a bruise from from over a year ago. It just increases all that and makes things so much worse. I've been trying to eat an anti-inflammatory diet, but being in Mexico is making it harder. I think I might need to start going back to that diet because I do feel myself getting more and more tired as the days go on. You also stop trusting your body's signals until they become too loud to ignore. So that goes back to the costochondritis. My body was literally telling me to slow down and then eventually it just got fed up with me. And it's like, okay, here you go. Now you have to slow down. You're gonna suffer. You're going to suffer hard because you didn't listen the first time I told you. And then it can also build resentment in your lifestyle and towards your partner, even if nothing big happened. You just get so irritated. You start to be like, I don't even care about the damn sunset. I just want to rest. You just get so frustrated by it. And you're like, I don't even want to do this anymore. So if you love this lifestyle and you want to keep doing it, don't burn yourself out. Take the rest. I keep telling you, take the rest. Just trust me on that. It also prevents the everything was a blur feeling at the end of your trip. I can't tell you how many times I mentioned this earlier that Will's like, oh, you remember this thing then? No, I do not remember this thing that happened. Like, I have no recollection of it. No idea. Don't know what happened that day. Don't know what we did. Completely gone. Gone, gone, gone. So what we need to do is learn to reframe rest. So rest is actually a skill. It's not just a state. It's something that you have to learn how to do. And there's a huge difference between lazy rest and actual active rest. And lazy rest, it looks like laying in bed, scrolling on your phone, watching Netflix, scrolling through TikTok, um just you know wasting time on things you don't really need to be doing active rest is more like you know i'm gonna go out and sit and watch the sunset i'm not gonna look at my phone i'm just gonna kind of be in this moment and enjoy this beautiful moment enjoy mother earth and these beautiful colors that light up in the sky look at how the the clouds glow listen to the waves crashing on the shore just kind of like allowing all of your senses to fully be there and feel the moment and that's why the the five senses technique to ground yourself is one of those things that helps people calm down you know it's like the okay name five things that you can see in the room now like look around and name those five things so okay I see those really cool aesthetic little light bulbs I can see my sunglasses on the table I see this beautiful plant in the corner I see this beautiful framed artwork on the wall and I can see my shorts on the floor where they shouldn't be but we're not going to focus on that and then name four things you can touch so or for things you feel so right now i feel my hair touching my shoulders i can feel the weight of myself sitting on this couch i can feel the mic in my hands i can feel this weight in my chest right now i can feel it it's a little heavy right now don't know why couldn't tell you why So now name three things you can hear. So right now it's pretty quiet, but I can hear the wind outside blowing the trees. I can hear Will moving a little bit in the next room. And I think I can hear the waves crashing on the shore very, very faintly. That's another one is trying to listen to the furthest thing that you can hear. So number two, the last one, two things you can smell. So I can smell the salty air, and I can smell my London fog. Now one thing you can taste, I can taste the taste of my London fog lingering on my tongue. So, five things you can see, four things you can touch, three things you can hear, two things you can smell, and one thing you can taste. And just be there in that moment. Go to the beach, feel the sand on your feet, Feel the breeze on your face. Hear the ocean waves. See the beautiful view. That is active rest. Doing nothing on purpose. It might look like reading a book for you. It might be just sitting in a hammock outside. It might be just going for a nice little walk, enjoying the scenery. I mean, technically, you're not really resting, but if you just go for a nice, slow-paced walk, that works. So here are some takeaways from what I've learned about how costochondritis forced me to slow down and how Baha has taught me to slow down. So I am shifting my routines and my mindset and content creation goals. What I'm working on is... Waking up without checking my phone right away. Sure, I grab my phone to turn off my alarm and then I go straight to the Insight Timer app but I don't check my notifications. I go to Insight Timer app and I put on a morning meditation or some breath work. So I have a really nice, slow, long morning routine that allows me to hit on every area where I'm struggling with things. I have something in my routine to help with cortisol. I have something in my routine to help with hormones. I have something in my morning routine that helps with anxiety, something with depression. It's filled with a lot of really great things that are good for your soul, good for your mind, great for your body. I've learned to let days be less planned because if it ends up planned like one thing with van life is if you make a plan it's probably not going to happen how you want it it's not going to happen to plan so letting days not be planned just kind of be like this needs to get done this needs to get done but when it gets done doesn't matter and then this is one that i still struggle with but creating content that i enjoy and not caring if it flops The Instagram algorithm has hated me for a long time. I don't know what happened. I've never bought followers in my life. I grew organically, but through reels, like I kind of blew up at one. I didn't like blow up. I have 50K, which is a decent amount, but I've been going through and removing ghost followers. So if eventually you see me down to 20K, that's why. But at some point I grew from 5K to 20K within like two weeks. And then a few months later, I grew from 20K to 50K within like a week and a half or something. So it grew really fast and I took breaks here and there. And then all of a sudden, like my content just hasn't been getting pushed to anybody. Like, I feel like nobody sees it, but yeah, I need to learn to just create content solely because I enjoy it and not caring if it gets 20 likes or a thousand likes. But it's been a really big struggle. and i'm learning to and something else that i'm doing is trying to remember that if i need to take a nap or if i need to just rest and relax This nap and rest is so much more productive than anything else that I could be doing on my entire to-do list because the rest is what's going to be able to let me complete all these things on my to-do list. The rest is what's going to allow me to keep living this life. The rest is what's going to allow me to keep traveling and see beautiful places. And if I miss out on something, I just start reminding myself of all the beauty that I still got to experience and will still get to continue experiencing. Okay, so for this part, I'm going to read it right off my Mac because this one I actually scripted out and typed out exactly how I wanted it. Like throughout this, I'm kind of just looking at bullet points and just saying everything off the top of my head, but this is a little bit different. This is my little postcard moment. So if I could write a postcard To myself, back when I was rushing and pressuring myself to see and do everything, it would say, you don't have to see it all to have lived well. You don't have to capture every sunrise to remember how it felt. You're allowed to rest, even when the world looks its most beautiful. Your worth isn't tied to how much you do or how far you go. Slow days aren't wasted. They're the reason you can keep going. Take the nap. miss the hike, you're still on an adventure. Thank you so much for listening to this week's episode of Postcards I Never Sent. If you ever felt that quiet pressure to do more, see more, and prove that you're making the most of your life, even when you're running on empty, I hope this episode reminded you that rest is all part of the experience. Not everything has to be earned. Sometimes the most meaningful moments come from simply letting yourself be. If this episode resonated with you, I'd love it if you left a review or shared it with a friend who might need to hear this. I've got so many more stories, spirals, and soft revelations coming your way in future episodes. Until then, go take a nap, go take a slow breath, let yourself miss a sunset if you have to, And just remember that just being here is enough.