The following is a guest post from Céline Pasche. Céline, her husband Xavier and their two daughters are nomadic and travel the world by bike. This is their story.
Can We Reinvent Ourselves Each Day?
We are all faced with the challenge of diving into the unknown. It was always true but it seems that somehow the current situation has made it even more tangible. The next page of the book we have to write is blank. How can we calm our minds in the face of this uncertain future ? How can we transform it as a way to reinvent ourselves each day ?
I am a nomad on bike with my family, cycling on the roads of the world for more than 12 years. Every night, I sleep in a tent with my partner and my two daughters. We get up at the break of dawn and never know where we will sleep that night. If there is anything I have learned during these years of nomadism, it is to dive into the unknown every second. I have learned to have a gigantic void in front of me. I am immersed in different environments, different cultures and I write the story of my day with each pedal stroke. I never know what is behind the next turn. I can't project myself further than the next ten minutes.
Expectations Shape Our Reality
We build our world on our expectations. Conscious or unconscious, they shape our reality. They come from cultural norms, from our routine, from our planning, from our projections, sometimes from our desires. For example, imagine taking a shower, you certainly think of the hot water that will run over your skin. And yet, I can assure you that all my expectations have been wiped out. Our showers are rarely ideal. The problem in itself is not the cold water, the dripping spray or the insalubrity of the place. The problem is when deep down I had planned to appreciate this moment, when I had passionately desired it. Then the frustration becomes intense, I am angry, disappointed, in tears or sometimes discouraged. This mixture of uncomfortable emotions does not come from the real situation, but from my expectations and especially from the need behind it. Perhaps this shower was meant to satisfy my need for softness and relaxation. But often, the frustrations are such that I am blind to what is really inside me, I only perceive my unfulfilled expectations.
Our expectations are also unconscious. Coming from Switzerland, when a blue line is drawn on a map, it means there is a river or a stream flowing with fresh water. It is only in Tajikistan at more than 14 000 feet elevation in a world of rock and dust that we realized this belief. Despaired, we are then with my partner in front of a dry bed, without water on the horizon. We had just revealed one more expectation.
We Can Transform Our Outlook
Our expectations are all those projections that we make in the future and that prevent us from living in the present moment. Because in the end, it is not what happens to us, but the fact that it does not correspond to what we had imagined that creates so much resistance. I learned to deal with what is, because all my expectations, even the smallest ones, were disappointed. And above all, I understood that the only thing I can transform isn’t what happened but it is my view of the events. And from this new perspective, a new way can be created.
Diving Into The Unknown
Accepting to dive into the unknown is to stop living on the expectations we create and to center ourselves on what is happening in the present moment. It's accepting not to control what comes up, but to be open to what is. As nomads, we have learned to have a huge void in front of us, which we cannot fill with expectations and certainties. Perhaps we have learned to grasp the unknown? However, to master it is not to dominate it. On the contrary, it is to open up, to let Life guide us. Because when our future is free of our expectations, everything is possible. When nothing is fixed in the mold of what must be, the unexpected can finally emerge. By leaving space, we allow new things to enter our lives.
Let Life Intervene
No one knows what the future holds, so every morning we are free to write the new page of our life. We can choose at any moment how we will live what comes up during our day. We can be aware of all the choices that animate us. We can give ourselves the right to reinvent ourselves daily. We have the opportunity to open ourselves to spontaneity, to listen to our innermost follies, to our greatest dreams, to be what vibrates deep inside us at any given moment.
For me, this state of being gives me a wonderful feeling of security, because whatever happens, nothing is fixed and everything is possible. Thus I can let Life speak to me and synchronicities guide me. All these nights spent in a tent have been so many initiations to learn to trust in Life.
We will keep cycling in the world with Prevelo bikes guided by our intuitions and the four cardinal points of our compass: to live, explore, share and inspire.
Céline Pasche
The Bike Family Nomads
Since 2010, Celine and Xavier are bike nomads. Their two daughters were born along the way. Nayla (2013) is the first toddler to have crossed the Nullarbor Desert in Australia by bicycle and Fibie (2017) is the first baby to have cycled through the coldest desert in the world, the Gobi Desert.
They are ambassadors of a life in the outdoors.
Nomads, writers, speakers and life coach, Celine is also an anthropologist and Xavier a photographer.
They wrote two books:
- Nomads in the heart of the elements (2017)
- Bike Family Nomads (2021)
They chose Prevelo for their daughters’ bikes.
www.ylia.ch