The Day I Remembered What It Felt Like to Be Alive

Three months after Mike died, I stepped off a plane in Tokyo. Alone.

I don't know what I expected. Numbness, probably. That fog you carry around when grief has become your default setting.

What I didn't expect was to suddenly feel like myself again.

I remember walking through the streets of Tokyo with Nori, my guide. The noise, the colour, the ramen steam rising from tiny doorways. The absolute foreignness of everything. And somewhere in the middle of that beautiful chaos, something shifted. I was present. Fully, completely present. 

It was the first time I'd felt alive in over a year. It was such a tangible feeling that it almost shocked me.

Looking back, I can see how far back it started - that slow dimming that happens when you're in survival mode. Mike's diagnosis. The treatment. The setbacks. The watching. I'd turned on my "be strong and survive" switch and left it there. Before I knew it, feeling alive had become a distant memory.

And here's the thing I didn't realise until Tokyo: I'd started going numb well before Mike got sick. Life had gotten comfortable. Predictable. Routine. I was functioning perfectly well and feeling almost nothing.

Midlife does this. Especially to women who've been running hard -  career, family, all of it = for twenty-plus years. You stop noticing the world. You stop doing things that startle you awake. And then one day you look up and wonder where you went.

Adventure is the antidote.

Not necessarily Tokyo. Not necessarily a flight to anywhere. This year in Bali, I hopped on the back of a Gojek motorcycle rideshare. Mike would never have approved. I did worry about insurance, but I was also absolutely delighted. Weaving through the streets, smelling the buttered corn being barbecued, seeing the place from the back of a bike - I felt, stupidly alive.

That's what adventure does.  It breaks you out of your own head. It puts sensation back in your body. It reminds you that the world is bigger and stranger and more beautiful than your routine allows you to see.

It doesn't have to be dramatic. It can be a cooking class in a neighbourhood you've never visited. A solo dinner at a restaurant you've been meaning to try. Saying yes to the thing you'd normally decline because it's too far or too different or too something.

The point isn't the destination. The point is the feeling of stepping slightly past your comfort zone and finding yourself still standing on the other side - a little breathless, a little more you.

If you're in midlife and feeling the dull grey creep of it - that sense that something's missing but you can't quite name it - do one small thing this week that scares you a little. Book the trip. Take the class. Get on the motorcycle.

Feel something. It's worth it.

And if you're building a business right now - the aliveness you feel from adventure? That energy comes home with you. It shows up in how you talk about your work, how you show up for your clients, how willing you are to take risks. Adventure isn't a reward for when the work is done. It's fuel for doing the work better.