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Jul

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The Fun is in the Journey by Julie Larson

What is your family motto? Do you have one? Maybe you never thought about it. Today might just be the day to create one. Ours is “the fun is in the journey”.

Often, we think of a journey as a physical one, but it can also reflect a journey through a relationship, through a career, a hardship, a sport, an actual trip, or just through life in general.  Regardless of that journey, it is the experiences that spans over a course of time. It is those experiences that make us who we are today… the sum of many journeys through the large journey of life.I can hear my parents saying our motto now in my head. When I think back through the years and those words hanging in the air at intense moments, I remember rolling my eyes and growling back through gritted teeth (and or hot rolling tears), “I really don’t like that saying, I am NOT having fun and I don’t want to be on this type of journey anymore!” They would just laugh and smile back at me.

Like many things, hindsight is twenty-twenty. We often don’t see the humor or importance of a situation when we are in the middle of it. Let’s be real, are we having fun when we are up at three in the morning with a crying baby, night after night? How about struggling through a bad job situation? Or how about the journey we all experienced with Covid-19 this past year? That journey seems to still be persisting along and has not been a lot of fun for the majority of us, but what will we remember in 5 years?

Do you ever reflect back and think, how would my life be different if I would have done this or that?  My husband and I do that often, we say “I wonder where we would be if we would have taken a different job, decided not to move to Utah, or bought a different house?”  We would have different friends, different lives, different challenges, and overall experiences.

Let me give an example. I am a skier, not a great one, but pretty good. This is somewhat surprising because I grew up in the flat rolling hills of Ohio (yep, in the heart of “The” Ohio State University – OH – do I hear an IO?). I first learned to ski when I was young with mismatched winter clothing and a pair of jeans on some random, small slope. I can confidently say, jeans are not always the most comfortable pants in the world especially when they are wet, frozen and you are attempting to be athletic.

My skiing continued very irregularly through my youth. Never owning skis or official ski clothing and definitely never a lesson associated with me while being on a ski hill. I even went to school in Florida where the weather was warm and balmy year-round (my husband equates that to muggy and sweaty).

 

When I graduated, I packed up the car and headed west to the little place called Aspen. Does this sound like a line from the movie “Dumb and Dumber”? Perhaps. Aspen was a destination; an adventure that was only supposed to be for a few short months. However, my life journey had different plans for me, and I fell hard and fast for the mountains. Flash forward 10 years later; I had finally bought skis, endured a broken shoulder, slid down many mountainsides on my backside, landed into a few tree wells, attempted and failed a few jumps and I even threw in a few ski lessons. On top of all that, I was lucky enough to find my husband and life partner.

Now our family lives in another ski town called Park City, Utah. Skiing is our regular weekend activity for our entire family. Little did I know that my ski journey would extend beyond my family fun and tie in with my career.

My position with RLL takes me to nationwide conferences which typically include a traditional 10 x 10-foot trade show booth with a lot of small talk, gallons of average coffee and throbbing feet. When I found a few ski events catering to the habitational/real estate industry, IRHS being one of them (a shout out to all the regulars or should I say “groupies”), I was eager to attend. Then RLL hosted their first annual 2020 ski conference and I was truly in my element. I was able to create lifetime experiences with some of our clients, prospects, and key industry figures. I was able to share amazing mountain views on a crisp winter morning, glide down the perfectly groomed corduroy ski runs, delight in the tasting of fine wine and whiskey, a moonlit snowcat ride ending with a feast of mouthwatering cuisine in a cozy yurt. My journey with skiing paid off and was literally fun.

If you are reading this blog, you might pause for a moment and think, “what journey am I on right now?”  Maybe you just changed careers, you broke up with your significant other, or even worse you experienced health issues? Those don’t sound fun, those sound hard. You see, the word “fun” is not always, “fun”.  This word takes on a new meaning. Many of us might agree, the things that come easy to us, really aren’t that fun, it is the things we work at the hardest, the ones that might be risky or hurt the most that seem to stick out.  It is the challenges that we face and the anguish of the race and crossing that finish line.

This all sounds so heavy, but it is not meant to be. It is really just about how you might look at life. You are reading this blog and it could be the first step of a new beginning, perhaps a new path, a new motto? Who knows where this blog might help guide you, maybe to the slopes of RLL’s 2022 VIP ski adventure? I know I will be there!

In closing, thank you mom and dad for teaching me the true importance of those “fun” moments. You were right, the fun is in the journey!

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