The Quiet Bravery of Going Alone

There's quiet courage in going through something even when it doesn't happen as you imagined.



The original plan was shared. A trip with a friend, a familiar face beside you in unfamiliar streets. But life shifts. People need to be elsewhere. And suddenly, you're faced with a choice: wait for the perfect timing... or go anyway.

 



Going alone doesn't always mean loneliness. Sometimes, it means finally listening to your own pace. Taking up space without explaining why. Being still in a new place, with no one to ask "what's next?"


There's a strange beauty in that.


It's in the moment you arrive and realize no one's waiting for you. In the way you set up your tripod like an old friend.



In the quiet confidence of asking directions in a language that isn't yours, but trying anyway. 

In the way strangers smile when you say good morning, and for once, you really feel it.

(The tour guide from a different group took this photo because he saw that I was alone.)


Traveling solo doesn't make you brave by default. It reveals the bravery that's been in you all along, the kind you've been too busy, too distracted, or too scared to notice.

(I asked the Maxim driver to take a photo of me with his helmet because I found it cute.)


It tells you: You are enough. Just as you are, standing there, figuring it out.



You learn to listen to your gut. To trust that if you get lost, you'll find your way back. That if it gets too quiet, you'll know how to comfort yourself. That you can witness the world, its noise, its stillness, and not feel small.

(I asked a young boy to take a photo of me and compensated him with my coins, hehe.)

And maybe that's what growing up feels like. Going anyway. Taking the trip. Facing the silence. Enjoying the cafes alone. Loving a city that doesn't know your name.

It's not about proving anything.

It's just... knowing you can.

_kenny🖤




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