Three Lessons Learned from a Leap of Faith

when i was 18 years old i traveled on 73

flights

to 46 countries and in this year i saw

the sun rise over mount kilimanjaro

nearly had my arm bitten off while shark

diving in cape town

and fed bananas to wild monkeys as they

bolted through the panama canal

so i know what you might be thinking

this is the story of some

reckless teenager who runs away from

home in search of women in parties

and admittedly there might be some truth

to that

but i assure you it’s a much more

meaningful story

so what philosophical lessons did i

learn in my teenage globetrotting year

well let me tell you here are the three

themes to my year

around the world theme one

you’re one yes away

now this isn’t an admission into a

prestigious university

it’s not an acceptance into a top law

firm or a yes that anyone else gives you

for that matter

it’s an empowering yes it’s a yes that

only you can give yourself when your

back is against the wall you’re staring

in the face of adversity

and no one is going to give in to that

decision but you

so i look back at the decisions that

change the trajectory of my life

and they all have to do with me saying

yes in a moment where i know would have

been

much easier and that first yes came when

i was just 17 years old and living in

sunny san diego california

i came from a beautiful neighborhood

comfortable background

great tennis training so yeah on the

surface

everything seemed great but

underneath that superficial layer

i struggled with anxiety and depression

i felt

trapped and alone and there were

countless times that i would wake up

and i would wish that my day was over

from the second it began

and so i knew that i needed a change of

environment to change my state of mind

and for that reason i made the decision

to leave home before my senior year of

high school from san diego to naples

florida

where i trained for tennis at the

academy of sanchez casal

and that was a yes

and because of that one yes my mental

health improved i achieved a junior

world ranking

and i was on track to play college

tennis

now instead of going down that path i

wound up pursuing other opportunities

that the academy opened for me

i became a contributing writer for

florida tennis magazine on my

experiences traveling the world for the

sport that i love

i also founded legends united a

charitable platform for professional

tennis players to donate their signed

equipment

and those opportunities eventually led

me to travel alongside the professional

tours

where i met so many of my childhood

idols which ultimately led

to my gap year traveling the world

before starting at the university of

miami

and so had i not given myself that first

yes

and left home from san diego to naples i

might not have had the courage to make

that second yes and that third yes and

all of those yeses

that followed and so this initial idea

of me escaping my reality turned into me

embracing

myself i was finally saying yes

to myself and so

in my trademark flip-flops with my

passport in hand

and a bag filled with nike tees and

shorts i embarked on the adventure

of a lifetime the one i knew that i

was deserving of a living

theme two make yourself uncomfortable

so it’s one thing to give yourself this

yes and it’s another thing to make the

most out of this yes

so i’ll go back to may of 2019 where i

was in the middle of my year around the

world

i had just done three weeks of chasing

lemurs around madagascar and

sailing around the musandan peninsula of

oman and i had just 26 hours left

before this segment of the trip was over

i was in tel aviv

now instead of spending those 26 hours

sauntering tel aviv’s palm line

boardwalk or

getting a good night’s sleep and even

though i knew it was a logistical

nightmare

i decided on a day trip to one of the

world’s seven wonders petra

in jordan now the bus departed at an

early 3am

and when i arrived midday i wound up

hanging out with a young australian guy

alex now alex being the charismatic guy

that he is

convinced me to climb the sandstone

cliffs of petra in not

hiking boots but in my flip-flops

and despite nearly falling off the ledge

to my death that day

alex and i made beautiful memories

underneath the jordanian sun

atop the cliffs of an ancient city

unfortunately i only spent a few hours

in petra before making the long

7 hour bus ride back to tel aviv and

barely catching that 5 am flight to

miami

but the point of this story is not my

time in petra per se

but rather the start of my friendship

with alex

because just a couple weeks later i flew

from guatemala city

alex flew from prague and we met in

buenos aires where we started a

three-week expedition around south

america together

and in those three weeks we impersonated

journalists to sneak into south

america’s most

revered tennis stadium and we indulged

ourselves in two more of the world’s

seven wonders christ the redeemer in

brazil and machu picchu

and peru and those are some of my most

cherished memories

and then just six months later alex and

i flew to australia

where i stayed in his home and met and

bonded with his friends

friends of friends

so again it would have been easy for me

to have gotten a good night’s sleep in

tel aviv that day

before making that 5am flight back to

the states

but sometimes it’s not the most logical

decisions

that gets you the most out of your yes

it’s about making yourself uncomfortable

and committing and embracing to all of

those feelings that that gives you

and so

theme three memories don’t belong to a

moment

they belong to you so once you make your

most special memories

you owe it to yourself to keep them and

so for the last anecdote i’ll share

i’ll go back to the end of 2019 where

just hours before new year’s

i was sitting at the dinner table with

steb and his family whom i had met

spontaneously

during that winter break trip in

melbourne australia

now just before we started eating dinner

seb’s father looked at me in the eyes

and raised his glass

offering a toast to new friendships

but the thing is that toast wasn’t just

for seb’s family and myself

it was for everyone who would welcome me

into their lives with open arms that

year

and it’s difficult to articulate but

when tapping glasses

memories flooded back to me those that i

wanted to hold on to dearly

those that had made me laugh that had

made me cry

and that had made me love and had i not

held on to those memories

kept in touch with all of those amazing

people

they wouldn’t have meant much at all

because they would have been lost

stolen from me by a moment but by

holding on tightly

i hold on to my time with cuhan in spain

when we snuck out of his tennis academy

and he crutched through the rustic

streets of palm de mayorka with a

sprained ankle

or with bongani and lesotho when we

drove through the guts of south africa

and ventured into one of the world’s

most remote countries

with kofi and manuel in mozambique who

were hitchhiking through the swaziland

desert when i found them and we drove to

their home city

of maputo

with emma kenny and sam in the cayman

islands who despite only knowing me for

a couple of weeks

invited me to swim alongside them in

stingrays in the caribbean

with joaquin and guatemala when we raced

atvs

up the mountains and through the

greenery of the old and beautiful

city with laks and cambodia

when we took tuk-tuks through the

capital of phnom penh

and then found zen in the royal palace

or with manu and his beautiful family in

the philippines

when we drove up the windy roads of

palawan to el nido

where we were surrounded by colossal

limestone cliffs

and crystal clear waters

now these are just a few of my most

cherished memories

but the truth is that i made hundreds

and i am a collection

of those memories

you own your memories

you assign your memory’s value

you are a collection of your memories

and so i know that not everyone will be

able to take a year off

or might even want to travel for that

matter

but what i do know is that everyone will

have the opportunity to take a leap of

faith

at some point and that leap of faith

will be different to everyone

it will be unique to you

and that’s beautiful in itself so just

know

that you’re one yes away from changing

the course of your life

your one uncomfortable moment away from

meeting a best friend

and you’re one toast away from reliving

your most cherished memories

thank you

you