I've learned more about myself in the past 12 months than in my 22 years. Not because I was hitchhiking, trying Singaporean Hainanese chicken rice for the first time, or hiking my way up a glacier in New Zealand. But because I was forced to stop. To think. To write. And frankly, there was nothing to do but be alone with my thoughts. And I don't want to romanticize or simplify - I saw more boredom and emotional reckoning during this time too.