I love getting lost. Not “I-was-meant-to-arrive-half-an-hour-ago-and-I-still-can’t-get-off-this-ring-road” lost (a frequent type of lost I encounter), but the kind of lost where you’re wandering along and then look up and realise you’re somewhere new and interesting. The kind of place you only find accidentally, probably because you’re already lost in your own thoughts.

I hate feeling lost, however, which I feel increasingly often. Sometimes it feels like the world is moving very quickly and I’m struggling to keep up, and I don’t have people there to egg me on in the same way, or help me work out which direction to go when I get confused and scared. Or rather, I have some people, and those people are great (cheers to those people) but they can’t always be there, and sometimes I lose them as well accidentally, and then it’s all just a whole bundle of lost.

So, like everything in my life (apparently), I’ve approached it from a linguistic point of view. Why am I worried about feeling lost, or being lost? Maybe I should just be focusing on getting found.

And before we continue, let’s clarify what we mean by get found. I am not looking for talent scouts. Photos of me are not posted somewhere on the internet (except here, and Facebook, and Instagram, and…shut up). I just mean getting that feeling of comfort you get when you’re in a place you know really well, or with people you know really well. Warm and fuzzy and home.

A great way to get found is to make everywhere feel like home, so I’ve been paying more attention when I walk. Which is more impressive when you remember quite how obsessive I am about my surroundings and seeing new and interesting things (for reference, my instagram)

I know that 10 years down the line (if blogging/the internet/the Earth still exists then) this is going to be one of those posts that I look back on and cringe, but right now, this is the thing I want to capture. Sometimes, life is scary, and it takes you in directions you weren’t expecting which almost always means you don’t end up where you’d planned. Don’t let it get to you. You don’t have to feel lost, you can find yourself (this is the cringe moment, you’re welcome) instead.