conquering the world.

      A few years back, I stumbled across a quote that read something like, “I feel the need to conquer the world yet I have no clue how just yet.” I aptly posted this in the quotes section of my Facebook and told everyone I knew about it, thinking it was the bees’ knees. It made so much sense. For one, I was an angsty teenager, who wanted feel lost in the world, and, two, I genuinely felt like I had the potential to do something awesome but that I couldn’t, for one reason or another. Years went by, I went to college, met a few people, got a job, became more of a person. Yet, I still felt that, though I had everything I needed, I couldn’t get to that mountaintop, wherever it may be. There was something missing.

       In one sense, you could argue that I conquered the world. I have literally been around the block and back to tell you about it. But, in the sense that my quote means to say it, SAS showed me that the world is ours for the taking. I don’t know how to “conquer the world” any better than I did before I left 4 months ago, and, even if I did, I don’t think I would be able to do it or define it, per se. What I do know is that there is nothing stopping me from trying.

      I met a farmer in Dominca who was in the process of writing a book, a 75-year-old man in Brazil who walks through the Amazon without shoes and climbs trees for fun, a reporter for a radio station in rural Ghana who developed a show based on ‘The View’ because he felt the need for a strong woman’s voice and so many more that I could not name them all. They are “conquering the world,” their world, and, if they can, why not me?
      Maybe Lewis Carroll said it best when he said, "If you don't know where you are going, any road will get you there.” Maybe I should just leave it up to the professionals.