In my era of trying new things
Salsa classes, skiing and a writing course
Over the past few weeks here in Lisbon I’ve really thrown myself into trying new things. While I know I could do that anywhere in the world, and I have in the past, I feel like living overseas has pushed me to branch out and try totally new things, some of them completely outside my comfort zone.
I have more spare time right now than I have in a long time, so I decided, why not use it wisely? Some of these things I’ve wanted to try for years, while others have been recent additions to the bucket list. Some are just because someone else invited me along, and I decided to say yes.
The anonymity of living in a new city has played a big role in it as well. You feel like you can be anyone and try anything, and nobody has any preconceived ideas of you. I guess that’s why people say they move overseas to “find themselves”, and as cliche as that is, I’m beginning to understand why that is true. You get the chance to try out being someone new. And while your old self doesn’t just go away, you get the opportunity to add to that version of yourself and try things out that you normally wouldn’t have dared to. Being in a city where you don’t know many people also means you have to put yourself out there if you want to make friends, and trying fun new activities has been a great way to do that.
Probably the most unexpected thing I tried for the first time was skiing. A few weeks ago, we went for a weekend away with some friends to the only place in Portugal that has snow to go skiing. Skiing was never something I’ve wanted to try really. I am a clumsy woman who is prone to hurting herself in ridiculous ways, so for that reason, skiing was never something I was particularly drawn to. I was convinced that if I did it I’d somehow break every bone in my body. But alas, my friend convinced me I had to do it, and ended up really enjoying it (no bones were broken). It was a very beginner-friendly slope, thank god, but I still found it scary. I wouldn’t say I was any good at it, but I gave it a go and had a good time, and that was all that mattered. I don’t think I’d go skiing again, if I’m honest, but I’m really glad I tried it!
My partner Nelson and I also recently gave salsa a go for the first time. Salsa is something that I have always wanted to try but just never got around to, so when some friends of ours said they had started lessons, we decided to go along with them and give it a go. The class we went to was beginner level, which was ideal because I don’t think I could have done anything harder than what we did in that class. I was worried about everyone judging me if I was bad, but there were about 50 people in the one class, and I quickly realised that everyone was too focused on themselves to notice me and my two left feet.
The one thing I’ve been wanting to do for months now is some sort of writing course. I’ve been wanting to pivot to writing as a career for a while now and during my time overseas I’ve been working to make that happen. Initially, I started out with this Substack newsletter, and then I got a couple of articles published (you can check them out here and here). Article writing is still something I’m pursuing, but I also thought, why not give fiction writing a go? I used to love writing and storytelling as a kid, so I decided I wanted to give it a go again, this time as an adult. I knew that one of the English bookstores in Lisbon here ran writer’s workshops sometimes so when a last-minute spot opened up in one of them, I jumped on it. It’s a 5-week fiction writing course, where we meet once a week on a Tuesday night. Each week we’re learning about different elements of fiction writing and doing exercises based on each one. We’ve also got the opportunity to share and receive feedback on our work with the class, which the idea of initially terrified me. I have a real fear of people judging the work I do and thinking I’m shit, but in this circumstance, I just had to remind myself that I don’t know any of the people in my class and that this was a valuable opportunity to let go of my fear of judgement and receive feedback to help improve my work in the future.
On the topic of writing, I’ve also been attending a lot of writer’s hours of late which are so helpful for someone like me who needs to be held accountable in order to get any words down on paper a lot of the time. I’ve been attending a weekly writer’s hour at a different English bookstore here in Lisbon since last year (that’s actually where I wrote most of these newsletters), and have just started attending more online ones. Being in a room for an hour surrounded by other writers gives me so much inspiration and motivation, I bloody love them. I was just working on this newsletter during one of the writer’s hours, but then Lisbon had an earthquake, and that really got me out of my flow (I HATE earthquakes).
A few other things I’ve been trying are in-person book clubs. I’ve been doing an online bookclub with some friends back in Australia for a while but I found one in Lisbon and thought it would be a good way to meet new people, and I’ve been enjoying them a lot. I also ended up going to a staged reading of a play with some of the people from the book club, which was something I’d never been to before.
I have thoroughly enjoyed throwing myself into all these new things over the past month here in Lisbon. It’s definitely been a real luxury to have so much spare time to do these things but while I’m not working full-time hours I figured I may as well make the most of it. Trying all these different activities has really pushed me even further outside my comfort zone and helped me grow.