Before the pandemic, I was living my best life, volunteering as a researcher of wild orangutans in Indonesia. I returned to the U.S. just four days before all airports were closed to international arrivals. I had become so relaxed in the lifestyle of a traveling wildlife volunteer that I couldn’t have imagined it would end. When I decided to take that four-month world trip, I had no idea that COVID would happen—that I would lose my livelihood and have to start over. 

Before COVID hit, I had been nomadic and living single for three years. Living a nomadic lifestyle wasn’t something I had necessarily planned, and it was not always easy. It was hard to find others like me traveling alone abroad. Sometimes someone would ask me where I lived and then get very uncomfortable when I told them, “I don’t have a home.” Knowing I could not afford to pay rent and travel the world at the same time, I chose to sacrifice a home and become nomadic. I had dreamed of traveling the world extensively since I was a child, and I was finally doing it. Travel was important to me, so a little discomfort did not matter. The thought of not being nomadic and having to work to pay the rent each month was more discomforting. 

Arriving back in the U.S. as COVID hit, I got depressed like everyone else. We were afraid for our lives and those of our loved ones. And on top of that, many of us had lost our livelihoods and our jobs. For me, the seasonal festival business that was my main source of income might not be open for years. Right when I had finally reached my childhood goal, it ended abruptly. Suddenly I had no income, and international travel was off limits. It was time to start something new. 

It wasn’t the first time I’d had to begin a new life. Three times before, I had lost almost everything I had. The first time was as a young adult when I moved from Georgia to the West Coast trying to help a partner escape an addiction to heroin. Ten years later, I had to restart again when I evacuated New Orleans in response to Hurricane Katrina. Finally, a few years ago, when my partner and I split up, we had to sell the Earthship home that we had spent several years—and every ounce of our income, blood, sweat and tears—to build. Each event was as heartbreaking as the last. 

When COVID came along, there I was, starting over once more. It never gets easier; the only difference was that starting over was not new to me. I wondered, “Why does this keep happening to me?” and “What am I supposed to learn from this lesson?” Once again, I was heartbroken for a life now gone; the sadness was overwhelming. I needed to know what the universe was trying to teach me.

Eventually, I began to understand. I remembered the other times that I had lost everything, and then I remembered what would happen next. A renewal always came from my tragedy. A rebirth. I finally began to see that after each loss, a better path always lay ahead—often a much healthier one. That realization gave me the strength and courage to keep going.

Choosing to trust that everything would work out relieved a lot of my worry and sadness that might have stunted my growth moving forward. I feel fortunate to have had those difficult experiences now. They remind me that there is no reason to believe that things will not work out. They always have in the past, and each time I have had to start over, an even better life lies ahead of me. ❧

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