Taking life ‘un’ seriously

Travel is in our blood and our soul. We enjoy discovering new places and revisiting old ones. Join me on this podcast as I share a glimpse into our trip to Alaska and encounters with the endearing Puffins that triggered thinking on clowning and practical steps on how to live life ‘un’ seriously.

Transcript

 Taking life ‘un’ seriously 

Hello Fellow Mavericks, welcome to another exciting episode of the ‘Ordinary Maverick’ podcast.

Alaska, a dream destination for a lot of folks. The land of glaciers, stunning natural beauty, oh, we hear so much about the rugged beauty of Alaska and get glimpses of the beautiful sights through movies and television. Like many others, we too, wanted to visit Alaska.

And we finally did. Got to it to mark a special occasion in our lives, a milestone anniversary. 

And did Alaska deliver and more! The beautiful vistas are sketched in our minds forever. It was picture perfect, to use a cliché phrase. Blue skies, snow capped mountains, the bluest of blue waters and the stunning wildlife. There’s a lot we learnt and experienced for the first time during our trip. Alaska, the 49th State in the US and the largest is one with over 100,000 glaciers, 3 million lakes and more coastline than all other States combined. It’s the land of the midnight sun, where in the northernmost parts of Alaska, the sun does not set for over two months during summer. And the interesting part is that due to the long hours of summer daylight, one can grow massive produce. One sees cabbages that can weigh over 100 pounds or roughly 46 kgs. Not that I am a huge fan of cabbage but a 100 pound one, wow, wonder how many people can eat stir fries from that one cabbage! Oh and one more fun fact, Alaska is the only State where you can type its full name on one row of the keyboard. Yes, go check that one out..i know you will hahahha…

But today I want to share about our encounters with the beautiful, colorful, endearing, Puffin. Puffins are sea birds that feed primarily by diving in the water and we had the most memorable time seeing them in their natural habitat nesting in crevices among rocks in the Ocean. We were on a cruise exploring the Kenai Fjords National Park and saw the nesting grounds of the horned and tufted puffins.

We witnessed their ‘flying’ dives in action where puffins flap their wings to swim after fish, being excellent hunters. Did you know that puffins flap their wings around 400 times per minute, yes, 400 times per minute to stay airborne. 

The Puffin is known for its intelligence and unique appearance. The different species all share certain characteristics, they have small stocky bodies, black and white plumage, large bills and orange red feet. The bill appears large and colorful during the breeding season. The colorful outer part of the bill is shed after the breeding season, and underneath is a smaller and duller bill. The tufted puffin is easy to identify as it has thick yellow tufts above its eyes that resemble a crown and is the largest of the puffin.

The Horned puffin has a black fleshy horn pointing up vertically from the top of its eye. And then the third kind, the Atlantic puffin. Atlantic puffin are  seen in the Northern Atlantic. They are the smallest of the puffins. But here’s the thing, they have the cutest, comical waddle. And are nick named the ‘clowns of the sea’ due to their vibrant, multi-colored beaks and, often, white face markings that resemble comical, painted clown faces.

Standing on the deck of our ship as we cruised the beautiful land and explored glaciers, watching the colourful puffins flying at breakneck speed, diving into the water, and chattering non stop as they went back to their colonies, I have to admit, it was almost as if time stood still. 

As I looked around, every single person on the ship had a smile on their faces, Puffins were flying at breakneck speed all around us, and their black, white and orange coloring with the backdrop of the blue of the ocean and the greenery around us, it was a stunning sight and a light moment all rolled into one.

Then it struck me, ‘clowns of the sea’. 

We’ve all had encounters with clowns on the land too. It might have been in a circus, or a show, or perhaps in an amusement park or a fair. Or it might have been in the movies. And all our encounters have left a smile on our face. 

What is clowning? It’s about not taking yourself seriously. It’s about living in the moment. The philosophy of clowning is to accept how we are, unconditionally. And there’s a liberating feeling that comes from when you totally, unconditionally accept your own self.

For a minute, I would like you to go back to a time when you saw a clown and remember what brought the smile to your face. It’s often when the clown unsuspectingly gets into a situation and then finds ingenuous ways to get out of it. And after some unsuccessful attempts, finally does get out. Right?

It’s almost as if the clown shows us that life often throws up challenges that are unforeseen in our lives. But the important lesson is that there is a way out. Might take some time but there is always, always a solution. And the clown falls right back up on his feet.

Often the clown shows us the extremes of emotions, laughing and crying at the same time. Fellow Mavericks, in life there are moments when we laugh and cry. We cry for losing something but at the same time we laugh with beautiful memories. The ‘clown’ in us shows us to be curious, to be always in awe and it’s ok to be surprised, to just spontaneously jump into something.

But the clown also shows us the power in being vulnerable, to be patient, to accept and take the time to grieve but then with resilience bounce back. 

Here’s one story from our family archives, light hearted and fun and which brings a smile to our faces each time we speak about it. It’s from our ‘fun’ memory bank. 

We were returning back from a vacation. We had a stopover in the UK and were excited to have this overnight halt in London. We rushed to the baggage claim thinking we will get our bags out and get to the hotel. Imagine the scene when all the bags got out except ours and on enquiry we were told that given the transit time the bags will not be given to us until our final destination. Wanting to travel light, we did not carry stuff in our hand luggage thinking we were anyway getting our bags. Ha ha…so here we are, without any change of clothes after a 10 hour flight with close to 40 hours of transit time in London! For some time we were lamenting and doing a bit of the blame game…who was responsible for this etc etc. but then we quickly caught ourselves and said wait a minute, this is the perfect opportunity to make it an adventure and just go with the flow! So off we went, reached our hotel, freshened up with toiletries from the hotel and stepped out to the nearest shops to buy the essentials. A travel disaster of sorts averted and turned into a fun adventure. It’s helped us become more resilient while traveling since and taking things in our stride. We’ve gone through flight cancellations, delays, lost luggage, lost passports, all sorts of travel woes…but in true Maverick spirit, have continued to fall forward and view these as adventures, experiences. On another more recent trip to India via  London, our daughter’s flight got delayed and she missed her connection, we said don’t worry, go and check if they let you step outside the airport. And yes, they gave her a 24 hour visa and the rest is history! She did a quick tour of the city, enjoyed some great food and got back in time for her next flight!.

Fellow Mavericks, life is never linear. The important thing is to remember that when the chips are down,  bring out the ‘clown’ in you. You may ask, how does one do that? It’s tough to gather yourself when things are not going ok, let alone find humour in the situation.

Well, let me walk you through some steps that have been helpful as an ordinary Maverick. First, take a deep breath when things go wrong or when you start seeing something unraveling. Then take another one and another one. Breathing is connected to our inner system and just a simple step of deep breaths helps calm our inners and brings us back from ‘panic’ mode to ‘thinking’ mode. Then keep focused on the task. Very often the panic or the sadness comes because we start thinking ahead. For example, our flight is delayed…now we are thinking we will miss our connection, we will lose our bookings, lose money, reach late etc etc, the forward thinking in this case increased the anxiety. Good to keep focused on the most immediate task at hand and not think too far ahead. Dealing with these and getting ahead one step at a time helps us.

And then before anything else, find the humour. That’s my biggest tip. Just for a minute, step out of the situation you’re in and look at it with a ‘clown’ framing. I guarantee that you will   immediately smile and you’ll see that solutions will follow seamlessly. If nothing else, put it as a learning and that it makes for a good story some day!. 

My dearest Mavericks, it’s all about not taking yourself seriously. Or shall I say, taking life ‘un’ seriously! 

Write to me about your experiences with being ‘un’ serious at ‘theordinarymaverick@gmail.com’ and follow me on Instagram #theordinarymaverick.  I love hearing from you. 

This is Ajey, signing off and wishing you have an amazing day! Keep well. 

This podcast series was put together as a team effort from the Bhardwaj family.  Concept, design, title, researchers and reviewers: Ajey, Sanjana, Avantika and Niharika Bhardwaj; Script– Sanjana; Cover design – Niharika. All rights reserved.