Do places change? Or those who change are ourselves...?

These days I´ll be lucky enough to be able to appreciate a country for the second time in my life, but this time I´m on a different stage of my life and I have a mindset very contrasting from the one I had that time I came to Guatemala as rookie nomad.

In my first visit to this selvatic, religious and welcoming country, mi intention was to explore it 100% with an adventurous mindset and to experience as much as I could while keeping an extremely - maybe exaggerated - low budget. By my own decision, I learned to live in a continuous state of scarcity and constant effort. Guatemala taught me that I am capable to accomplish a lot with very little, I learned that I´m not made of glass and that I can take several hits before breaking, I can grasp now how complicated is life when you are away from home, but it is completely up to you to change your reality.

My experiences in Guatemala span from being in a hospital with a possible broken back, a gun pointing at my head, a 39 celsius fever with no money for medicine, the first broken heart I left when I decided to continue traveling instead of staying with her, to living for a week with a local family with 6 daughters.

My Chapina (how guatemalans are called) adventure was about learning and self-discovery through risking my life every time I had the chance, but this time my travel style will be very different. Back then, Guatemala was the 4th country I visited in my whole life and it was the first one where I experienced several change of plans and goals; everything I had to go through during those 40 days marked an end and a beginning in my life, and whether it may be good or bad, it played an important role in who I am today.

This time Guatemala welcomes an Eric with a more specific goal, more than 20 stamps in the passport and a new way of thinking. I don´t have to prove to me what I am capable of, I already know that; I´m also conscious of my limits and I´m not planning on putting them to test - at least not this time, there will be a chance to do that in another ocassion. I still have a lot to learn and grow, but I feel that I´ve made a lot of progress compared to the man who came here a year ago.

I don´t know what to expect from this visit... The project I have prepared for this month involves having to re-visit every town I went the first time, but to explore them from a different point of view. I´m curious to see if these places are how I remember them, how I idealize the, how I described them in those posts I wrote when I was just starting on Steemit.

There is a phrase that I don´t recall who said it, or if I read it somewhere or if I´m just simply inventing it right now, but I have it engraved in my mind: "People and places, they don´t change, it is our own perception and mental state what makes them look different".

Well, it´s about time... I want to demonstrate the truth behind this phrase. I´m not going to say I´m not anxious about the outcome but, what I can say is that I expect it to be better than what I think. I wish my capacity for amazement is still there and I can enjoy this adventure to it´s fullest, I hope I don´t have to repeat to myself...

Remember, be Here Now