I've been saving this volcano email for the right time

"Are you guys seriously gonna get on a plane right now?"
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Three strangers sitting across from us at a fancy ceremonial matcha cafe had their eyebrows hitting the ceiling.

My friends and I were searching for the next Hawaiian Air flights from Oahu to the Big Island. I'm sure this looked chaotic.
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Everything was happening so fast, because it had to.
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✅ Book flight
✅ Find dog sitter
✅ Pack rain jackets
✅ Get to the airport in less than an hour
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If we wanted to see a volcano blasting lava 1300 ft into the sky, we had to operate in full-send-hail-mary-mode and move as if everything was gonna go our way.
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"We just gotta keep going until we get a definite sign from The Universe that this isn't happening."
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✅ Lyft ride acquired
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So far so good.
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Kīlauea had been poppin' off for about 4 hours by the time we hopped in our ride share and she could chill out any minute.

Catherine, the sweetest Lyft driver on the planet, had stories of driving other yolo-like passengers through ash and falling tephra large enough to close down parts of the volcano site.
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We were optimistic lol.

As expected, the GPS said it would take about an hour and 20 minutes to get there.
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We were pumped, chatting it up in the car, giddily repeating, "I can't believe we're on our way to see a volcano!"

Three hours later it was almost 8pm, dark, and pouring rain.
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We were stuck in one lane traffic, pulling over into the shoulder every hour to let emergency vehicles squeeze by.

Catherine even offered to stop the meter thingy running on Lyft because it just kept charging us for crawling 2ft every 5 minutes (we didn't let her).
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This was also when we realized we should probably book a hotel and start figuring how we we're getting a ride back.
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✅ Hotel booked...
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At least the sky was still red – still a sign that we were meant to see a erupting volcano for the first time in our lives.

At almost 9pm we somehow managed to find parking at the volcano site.
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Like a magical fairy-angel, our driver offered to stick around at the viewing cabin with us. She knew we'd never find any drivers on the Big Island willing to come get us out there (again, the sweetest Lyft driver on the planet).
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✅ Find a ride home
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We speed walked into the cabin, emptied our poor bladders, saw a wild pig in the lobby, and stepped outside where everyone was quietly watching in the rain.
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Full body goose bumps.

We were looking at the most active volcano in the world, blasting a wall of lava into the sky.

At this moment we realized how many things had to go our way for us to pull this off.
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Complimented by the sounds of a rumbling volcano, we recapped our whole adventure in detail, the things we were grateful for, and how wild this all was.
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And just as I said, "You know you the real MVP is? Catherine." She rounded the corner with 3 hot cocoas that she politely haggled the staff for (I'm telling you, ON THE PLANET 🌎).
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This was also blatant evidence on what could happen when you trust that everything will work out for you, as long as you focus on what you can control, and just take the next step.
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Once we made the decision back at the cafe, there was no time for hesitation, second guessing, overthinking, or wondering how we were gonna solve future problems that weren't in front of us yet.
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And every time something went our way, it compounded the belief that we were gonna see Kīlauea doin' its thing, even when I thought I was gonna pee myself in crawling traffic.
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To think that twelve hours before this, I woke up to a regular degular Sunday, until this opportunity presented itself.

We stared at the volcano and talked about life for two hours, Catherine, our magical-fairy-angel drove us through a Burger King drive-through with no line, and she dropped us off at our hotel.
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A very wholesome goodbye.

We changed out of our wet clothes, got in bed, and checked the volcano cam to find out that the Kīlauea was done for the night.
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We got there just in time.
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Life is filled with once in a lifetime opportunities, we just have to notice them and make up our minds.

There's a ton of positive energy swirling around right now, ready to expand whatever you want to put your focus on.
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​Take risks, live your life, and just go for it. ​
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✌🏾Simie✌🏾
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P.S. I'm coming back to YouTube. More on this in a future email!
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P.P.S. Task Alignment is opening up again this Sunday, Aug 9th. Stay tuned for deets.