Sun, sea and overthinking

Finding myself again one step at a time

Alison One Life
2 min readJul 22, 2023
Sitting here is great, but when should I stand up again?!

I’m pretty sure the philosopher Kierkegaard was also on a solo holiday when he wrote that “anxiety is the dizziness of freedom.” 😂

On the first full day of my solo trip to Albufeira, Portugal I had no plan, nothing that needed to be achieved and no one I needed to please. I couldn’t remember ever being so responsibility-less and the freedom was both wonderful and overwhelming.

I walked to the beach which was 5 minutes away from the hostel and when I reached the seafront I decided to turn left and keep walking.

The sun was shining, the waves were lapping at my feet and there was a slight sea breeze which was very welcome in the 30-degree heat. I listened to an audiobook, people watched and walked and it was bliss.

After a while I realised at some point I would need to stop walking and could sit on the beach. When should that be I wondered? And how long should I sit on the beach before I should start walking again?

These were simple and inconsequential decisions so why on Earth was I overthinking them and struggling to make them?!

I realised that my natural tendency when I’m with others is to go with the flow. More often than not I don’t have a strong preference and if that’s the…

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