Travelling light

I think the ultimate in travelling light isn't about the size of your pack, it's about what's in your head. The real baggage we all carry about isn't shoes and sleeping bags and souvenirs, it's all ghat other stuff that travels with us in our heads.
I have lost count box the number of times people have called me brave for heading off alone - and its nice that they think that. I count bravery as being one of the qualities I admire most in people and the one whose lack causes me the most horror. To be too frightened to actually live a full life seems to me to be taking away from that which actually allows us to be human.
The cliche is that bravery is feeling the fear and found it anyway. And it's a cliche because it's true. I hate flying, but I just take a deep breath, accept the two or twelve or fourteen hours of terror and get on that plane.
It took me an hour to work up the courage to try out for Xi'an Metro. I knew there'd be another awkward exchange as I tried to buy a ticket. The difficulty of following a subway map in a language I don't speak and the inevitable crush of humanity. But then you have to tell yourself - what could possibly go wrong? Screw up, find the way back to the starting point. Begin again.
Fear, defeated by logic! Or in this case by thirty three degree heat, sore feet and the need to not walk another five km!
So I am trying to travel light. I've bought my fear along with me, it insists on coming, but it's walking a few paces behind, minding it's own business. I can feel it there, watching for a moment of weakness, but I won't be letting it ride on my shoulders and weigh me down.