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She, Who Finds Alignment Living a Nomadic Family Adventure - Mel Lahr: Otter Voice Meeting Notes

She, Who Finds Alignment Living a Nomadic Family Adventure - Mel Lahr

Julie Confer38min

Candice McCoy

00:01

Hey, I'm Candace. And this is she who wanders a podcast from a great wonderlust. living outside our comfort zone can be easy to talk about and dream about. But what happens when we actually try to make moves to do it? How can we have the courage to live authentically and in alignment with our greatest values because it does take a lot of courage. Today's guest Mel lar is someone I admire so much because of her drive and commitment to push through fear and do the things her soul calls her to. Mel is a wife, Mama four plus two dogs and former social worker turned seven year Nomad, living on the road with her family in their RV. In those seven years, they've traveled all over the United States and parts of Mexico as well as internationally. Most recently, spending three months in Greece, a dreamer whose favorite place is exploring nature with her family. She's on a mission to inspire families all over the world, to live their best and most vibrant life by sharing tips for everything from education on the road to travel guides on destinations across the country. I can't wait to share her story and perspective with you. So let's get started. Now, welcome tishie, who wonders I'm so excited to chat today.

Mel Lahr

01:17

Thank you so much for having me. I'm really excited about this,

Candice McCoy

01:21

I gave a little bit of an overview of kind of just who you are. But I know there's so much more to your story. And I can't wait to get into all of it. But first, could you just fill in the gaps a little bit. Tell us a little more about you. And what brought you to where you are today.

Mel Lahr

01:34

My husband and I were both raised in Southern Illinois, I grew up in a town outside of St. Louis, Missouri, so very suburb, and I actually went to college there. And we started our family there. So we had never left. As of seven years ago, my husband was in the Air Force for four years. So he was very well traveled. But I had never lived anywhere else. We were living a very normal suburban life, a house that was too big, and you know, too much to clean every week, especially for someone like me who hates cleaning. But we had accumulated a lot of stuff. We were about 10 years into our marriage at the time, we had three kids, and we decided that we wanted to do something different. But the catalyst for all of that was we began homeschooling which quickly led to unschooling and all of our mindset about what the world looked like and what we should be doing. And life kind of shifted at that point. We moved into an RV, and the transition was craziness. And we haven't looked back.

Candice McCoy

02:39

Wow. I mean, when you decided to do this, it was I mean, now it's a little more herd of like people know that people do that. And it's like a thing, but seven years ago, did you have very many examples out there of people who are doing this,

Mel Lahr

02:52

I actually knew nobody who did that. I also knew nobody that was like homeschooling when we started a homeschool. So each of these baby steps into living differently. Were very much like we are jumping off the roof into a pool because we had no clue we had no models or examples. And I remember my husband said Surely there's other people doing this because I had a lot of fear. I was dreaming it all up thinking it was gonna be epic, but we can't do it. You know, like, let's just think about it all but I guess let's just dream about it and think about it and live in that imaginative world and not actually do the thing. And my husband, he said Surely there's other people and I ended up actually finding some podcasts and listening and hearing stories, family adventure podcasts, maybe. But anyway, it was it was highlighting families who sailed, biked. It's not even a podcast anymore. But it was excellent. Because I was able to like mow my lawn of all things, listen to some headphones, and just listen to people doing way crazier things even than our VA. We're also families who biked across countries together and lived and sailed around the world. I told my husband about these stories because I was trying to gain courage. And he said, Yeah, well, if other people can do this, we can too.

Candice McCoy

04:10

Yeah. And I feel like you It's hard when you're like you're in your real life. You're planted, you're rooted, you've always done the same thing to be able to fully just jump into this thing that neatly unknown, you've never done it. I mean, it takes a lot of vision and faith to jump. Yes, yeah. So super admirable. And you can now lead the way obviously, over the last seven years for other families, because a lot of people I think can't really grasp doing anything like that until they see somebody else making it happen. And then they're like, Oh, this is real, this can be done. And so I love that kind of a pioneer appreciate it.

Mel Lahr

04:47

Lately, my goal actually we didn't share on social media the first few years, honestly, because the transition was just hard. I can't imagine trying to openly share what we were going through as we're going through it until we really you know We're solidly at our feet on the ground with the lifestyle that gave us the confidence to share more, because inspiring more people just to live and let the spark inside come alive in some way. Reaching out of their comfort zone, these are the most rewarding things that have happened to us. So if we can encourage just one family to do that, ah, yes, yeah, that's the goal.

Candice McCoy

05:21

Yeah, I can see how that would be super fulfilling, because it just goes beyond you guys. And it becomes this web and this extension where you're impacting the world through it, you keep saying that the transition was really challenging. So what what was like some of the hardest parts of the transition.

Mel Lahr

05:38

So everything because we didn't have remote jobs. This was completely just a dream. We had all this stuff. So first, I read the book, KonMari Magic of Tidying Up, and I started just getting rid of and selling everything. And we thought if we can just have baby steps. And so in my master closet, we had like this big white board, kind of like a vision board, but it had very tangible baby steps. Like in order to live in an RV. We can't have all these things. So step one, get rid of stuff. So we were purging, purging, purging. We did that for like four or five months. And then my husband got offered a job in person. And Houston. So we transitioned from St. Louis to Houston. The day he turned in the I Accept letter, two hours later, we found out we were pregnant with my fourth baby.

Candice McCoy

06:28

Oh my gosh, oh, wow.

Mel Lahr

06:30

I was like, freaking out that like there was craziness because I don't have good pregnancies, I get really sick. And so I just remember sitting on the floor in my closet, and my sister was there. And it was the night before we were supposed to board the airplane to move to Houston. And she was just shoving all of our clothes into every bag we could find for me, because I was so sick. It's even scarier when you're pregnant to think about moving. Oh, sure. My family of five, almost six Yeah, into a tiny little space. So when we got to Houston, they put us in apartment. It took six months to sell the house. So we didn't buy an RV. We just moved into like a rental RV after the two month apartment thing. Okay. And then we lived in this rental RV, I was hugely pregnant, it didn't have a washer and dryer. And I had this like spin washer and dryer that would like be in the in the shower. And I was having to carry it outside when I wanted to shower and carry it back in my shower, because we have the laundry Oh, and then it was 100 degrees outside and Houston for like six months of my pregnancy. So just taking a walk made me like swell. And then I had three kids that had all this energy, and no nature and Houston to like take them out too. So it was it was pretty rough. I'm gonna be honest, like I was questioning why are we doing this? Why would we want to live in an RV? So

Candice McCoy

08:00

y'all, we're living in the RV kind of stationary in Houston for that time

Mel Lahr

08:05

until, yeah, until the house sold. So when I say we took Baby steps, I'm telling you why it was like, first we're homeschooling. And then we sold our stuff. And then we moved into a tiny space. And so we kind of got used to each thing a little bit at a time. Yeah, as soon as the house sold two weeks before our baby was born, we brought our RV home. And we moved in. Thankfully, it was two weeks before the baby arrived. So we had like a place to bring him and then we immediately started traveling within a month of him being born.

Candice McCoy

08:40

One question I really had for you was when you first because I think the thing that makes you guys even more unique other. You've got the fact that you started so long ago. But you have continually done this for I mean, I want to say almost a decade. I mean seven years is a long time. So did you have any idea or vision when you started that you would be doing this for such a long term,

Mel Lahr

09:04

I love to the romantic idea of selling at all, and just not having a choice. But to keep living this beautiful life I dreamed up in my head. When we told family we're like it's gonna be a year when we leave, I'd be like Luke, it's gonna be more than a year. But I'm gonna be honest and say that it was so hard the first couple of years on the road we just had so many mishaps and so many crazy things happened with our truck and kind of traumatic road kind of life issues that we probably would have given up head. Luke not already had a remote job. So we hadn't quite achieved that vision that I had in my head about living completely free of all of these things. So because we were still not quite there we kept just like pushing through towards this vision. And so I'm really glad that we went through all of that because it built resilience and it gave us this deeper understanding of this isn't going to be easy. So that has been actually one of the greatest gifts of the lifestyle. So now we've just accepted it as part of what we are doing. We want

Candice McCoy

10:14

to seek comfort, you know, but at the same time, we know that the things in our life that are the most valuable, most meaningful, most memorable, all those things usually come from the hardest challenges that we are able to overcome, it's great to be able to realize that and obviously that's going to affect how you are now and how you approach when challenges come. It helps give you that perspective, over time, when you're just constantly facing those kinds of challenges. You guys, I gotta be really tough. Honestly,

Mel Lahr

10:42

I don't know about that. This lifestyle still makes me cry, I have not like perfected or anything. And I think that's part of just growing older, and being 40 years old, you know, you just realize we're forever growing, we're forever going to be living this process of life. And it doesn't matter where we're at. If we're on the beach, in Greece, or in a house in the middle of a cornfield in Illinois,

Candice McCoy

11:05

it's so good, because I think when we're younger, we're constantly working to achieve this vision. And when we have that vision, then everything's going to click into place. And as you get older, and you keep chasing these dreams, you do realize that every dream you achieve, you still have a lot of the same problems, because it's life, and they're just a part of it. It's a really valuable lesson.

Mel Lahr

11:23

It's kind of hard to balance knowing that and not pushing too hard. Like knowing your family's limits with there were six of us now five of us and knowing we all have a different personality, we all have different needs and wants and this life every single day, we have a different vision of what it's going to be like, and it can't just be mom's vision, trying to balance everybody's perspectives. Everybody's Yes, it's a lot of work. And it's especially a lot of work when you're traveling. Even if you just take a one week vacation, it becomes evident, right? Somebody wants to be on the beach all day somebody needs a nap. Somebody is hungry when everybody else is fine, you know. So yeah, it's really interesting. I was thinking about this the other day, like, why didn't we world travel first? Why did we choose RVing. And I think part of it comes back to that comfort of knowing we have the same place to go home to, we have our own coffee pot in the cabinet that we know how to work, we have our own mattresses, we can shut the blinds at night. And it doesn't matter if we're parked in a Walmart parking lot. We have our cozy space as a family, especially with young kids, I think has given us that little bit of stability and comfort that we still needed to transition until traveling full time. So

Candice McCoy

12:39

because I think people look at it. And it seems like so much change. Like you're constantly changing, constantly moving. And you know, there's this thing, and I feel like society where people think like the highest value for kids is consistency, you know, and I think kids are a lot more resilient than people often give them credit for. But you have consistency. It's just looks different than other people's consistency.

Mel Lahr

13:01

It looks way different. Yeah, I mean, I can still turn, we still have our sound machines at night. So the kids fall asleep to the same noise. You know, we we have ways to make our house smell the same. But it's very interesting, too, because we were able to take a lot of those things with us to Greece. And that opened my eyes up a little bit of we can still make other places feel like home. Yeah, it took a couple of weeks to do that. But even with our viewing a lot of people get on the road, and they move really quickly because they want to see it all I get it. I totally Yeah, I think people would do this longer if they took their time. And they didn't try to move so quickly. Especially with kids, you can go month to month to month to another place. And it's okay. And speaking

Candice McCoy

13:45

of moving one thing, we talked about this a little bit before we started recording, and I really want to dig into it with you is I think we all have no matter what lifestyle you're living, there's always that challenge of staying present, you know, and for most people they know they're staying present in their location, but in their minds like what they're wanting to achieve or do next or the next step of life, being able to stay present but also considering what that next move will be, I think is a challenge for everybody. So I'd love to hear from you because you have this very unique situation where you're not only having goals and think next steps of your life, but also your actual location like where are we going to be next week or next month? Do you have any thoughts on how you kind of balance being present where you are and fully living in it but also constantly having to think ahead and figure out where that next place is gonna

Mel Lahr

14:34

be? Yes. So ideally, I would just live my life every day and explore beautiful places and just go with the flow and just drive to the next place. But you know, you have so many factors you have whether you have the people and how everybody's feeling right. And then you also I have a job as content creators, so I am constantly posting and sharing on social media. So because I'm doing that I'm always looking ahead where we're going to be in a couple of weeks. I'm also trying to be present and I can say the number one thing that forces me into the present is nature. That also is the number one thing that helps everybody's mental health. I can tell you every single hike starts out with somebody's crabby when you have this many people, somebody's probably somebody's and somebody's like, why did you pick this hike? Does it have a waterfall like three miles, six miles, you know? Yeah, but by the end of the hike, everybody is golden at everybody is feeling good. And it's, I think a combination of you're exercising, you're getting those endorphins going, but also nature is healing. And so I'm always seeking out wide open spaces in nature for my family. I've got this river behind me right now. It's meditative. The sound of that water moving, it's wonderful. But then at the same time, I'm I'm working right, so I currently am three weeks behind, and depending on if it's summer, or winter, or where we're at, I could be two or three locations behind. So I'm constantly having to relive, right, which I actually enjoy, enjoy going back posting those pictures, it helps me process through everything I've seen, probably,

Candice McCoy

16:22

especially with you guys seeing and experiencing so much, it really helps you seal it in,

Mel Lahr

16:28

it helps me seal it in because I think a lot of people travel and then they get to go home and then process through everything they've seen and done. And when you're constantly moving and constantly seeing new things, it can become overwhelming. So it's this crazy balance of what are we doing when we get there, I've got to the point where I don't plan what we're doing when we get there until we're on the way or our first day there. Just because it it helps me not stress and be in the mindset of being somewhere else.

Candice McCoy

16:57

And part of the joy of what you're doing is the flexibility and being able to kind of do it as you are ready and want to

Mel Lahr

17:04

I think I've learned over time too that like weather and kids moods, change everything anyway, so you can have all these plans all day, but then you're just gonna feel this like huge disappointment, when all of a sudden, like the valleys flooded, or there's a wildfire and we have to move, you have to be able to change up what's going on and have it be okay.

Candice McCoy

17:27

One thing I wanted to talk to you about is what does it look like to find community while you're on the move all the time, I've always

Mel Lahr

17:33

felt kind of like an odd person out. Not like, I don't fit in, per se because I have lots of friends and a really great group of people. But I always felt different. I'm introverted, Luke's also introverted. So it works out really well that we can go into these wide open spaces and be alone really connect and prove our family relationships and focus on each other. It doesn't happen as much when we're around other people. I know there's a lot of our viewers who travel in groups, and they love it. And they really get it, they get lifted up by that. But we get kind of lifted up just being off on our own. With that being said, though, like we were in British Columbia, Canada, and we're about to meet up with a family today that we met in New York City, and they've started living in Idaho, but they're just coming up here on an RV trip. And we were messaging last night and she's gonna be in the same exact place we are for two nights. So we're gonna meet up and we're going to hang out and we're gonna get that social time. We love hanging out with other people. We really have made some lifelong connections and relationships on the road. Like you've said, the RV community is huge. There's tons of families that you can connect with. And as you're weaving around the country, you see where they're at and you meet up with them. We're actually headed to Utah after this and we're gonna be around to families we know for like three months. Not that we don't enjoy community. It's just we thrive alone. And then seeing people here and there.

Candice McCoy

19:06

It's like a balance. I mean, it's your barbell, that kind of balance that works well, for sure. Yeah, I know you're very in tune with like the kids needs as you're going along on this journey to and I'm so curious if they're mostly introverts as well or do you have some extroverts? How's that been tough?

Mel Lahr

19:20

Because I have so many kids they have they have social time together. If I just had one or two and they actually are four or five years apart, but they like they've been playing out in this river, all three of them my 1410 and six year old, they take the paddle board up and they pull each other down. They've been building dams and they're just they hang out together. So they don't like not have social time. So it's definitely not something any of them are missing or asking for. Oh, and my 14 year old so you would think like teenager he must really want to be around friends and Yeah, and he's he's like, I don't know. He's totally Fine, he loves traveling, like loves it, I check in with my kids all the time. Do you guys want to keep doing this, you want to keep living this way, and he is 100% want to travel, but he also wants to play football. So we're headed to South Utah for three months, we get there late July, so we're going to be there. So he can play football at a public high school free, he'll be playing freshman football, which might mean every fall now for four years, we're going back there. It's really cool. The way that my kids have learned to step out of their own comfort zones, meeting friends and and holding those relationships long distance

Candice McCoy

20:36

you guys obviously live a lifestyle that's outside the box, so to speak. And I think a lot of times we view socialization, as this in the box, like this is what it looks like. And I think a good thing for people to realize by seeing different lifestyles like yours is that it doesn't have to look like typically is viewed. Socialization can look all sorts of different ways. And so I think it's just empowering to find what way really works for you and not feel stuck adhering to the way it's been done or the way you've seen it done. Hey, they're taking a pause to tell you about the wonder list. It's a weekly email I curate and share with our community of more than 1000 Women who are getting off the beaten path in both travel and life. Inside it, I share a roll up of inspiring stories of women in this community. And my favorite links to articles, podcast tracks, and so much more. I hear from women every week who find encouragement and ideas to put the most life into their days. So I'd love for you to join us, you can sign up for free at the great wander less.com/hello or follow the link in the show notes. Also, when you subscribe, I'll share a list of my favorite books to help you on your journey. For almost a decade now I've held a morning ritual for the health of my mind and spirit. Reading, praying, meditating journaling, I always start the day by infusing my mind with truth and connecting with my soul, which is really changed the quality of my days. So I'd love to send that list to you for free. When you join us, head over to the great wonder last.com/hello. And I'll see you there. Okay, now back to the combo. I would love to hear you just you're behind the scenes of how have you managed living with that different fears and anxieties. And I wonder even with leaving and going to Greece for three months, which was very different than what you guys had been doing? You know, did you have some of that? And how do you manage that in your life and just keep moving forward on your vision.

Mel Lahr

22:38

It's kind of complex, because this is definitely looks different throughout my life, staying home and my kids realizing I can take this step and to an alternative lifestyle of homeschooling that was so crazy and unreal to me. Little did I know, there was a whole underground society of homeschoolers that I didn't know were actually doing the thing. And as soon as I took the leap, it was wonderful. And it lifted me up. And all of a sudden, we're like, moving into this world of living in our souls purpose, and in alignment with what my inner values really matched up with, then you're starting to look at everything in your life, what is not quite matching up with what I really, really want. And that's kind of why I say homeschooling was the catalyst. So all of a sudden fear and anxiety don't seem so scary anymore when you do the Baby Steps right that I talked about earlier. So taking just one step, just doing it. I can tell you all day and all night just to have confidence and believe in yourself, but I wasn't there either. I have confidence now. And I can sit in this truth and the knowing of this is what's right for us. But I had to take each little baby step feel a little success, to kind of just realize, okay, it's okay to be weird and crazy and different. It's okay to just stay home with your kids. It's okay to live in an RV and travel you can live out your soul's purpose, but you have to listen to your inner knowing

Candice McCoy

24:01

every little decision that you make and every little step you take gives you that momentum to just keep going and that surge of satisfaction that comes with being in alignment really is addictive addictive like So like you said when you feel that in one area then you just start looking at all the other areas of how can I get this in all parts of my life you know, we have five values with the great wonder list and one of them is authenticity or living earnestly and an alignment with our values. I think even if you're now unschooling which is very outside of the box, even in the world of homeschooling to forge your own path that way, you must be really deeply connected to what your guiding values are, what values do you think really drive you on this path of unschooling or RV living and exploring

Mel Lahr

24:48

I have so many now you know, because you just start adding to them but if I take myself back to the beginning when we first started homeschooling and I thought I had to like make us rigid schedule for the day and we had to do XYZ and we had to get all these things done. But what I quickly realized it wasn't really working very well for my kiddos. And I've never been afraid to change it up if it's not working. So it was very easy for me to transition away from that. I had this network of homeschool families now and none of them unschooled, crazy concept of unschooling sounded like my kids would never learn anything, and that they would just play all day. And that wasn't okay. I went to college, went to grad school, went and worked in schools. So my head right was very much in this is what education looks like, I had to go through this huge transition process of what does education look like? Thankfully, Luke was really in alignment with the same sort of undoing of what we thought education look like that was super helpful to have his support, and also be just kind of in alignment with where I was thinking, we sat down, we're like, what would we want for our kids, when they grow up? Do we want them to be successful in these ways society says so. But what it came down to was no, we we want them to know how to learn, right? We want them to be eager and curious humans. And we want them to be like, just fulfilled and know how to seek joy and happiness. Once we shifted. And we started really focusing on those values. That's when our perspective changed on what education would look like in our home.

Candice McCoy

26:28

I love how you just kind of zoomed out like a bird's eye view. Because looking down and being like, it's not just about today, but like, what do we want for their future? What kind of person? Do we want them? Are we going to learn? Or do we want them to be in 10 years, 15 years, it really helps become a guiding force of what we're doing now, you know, always hear the phrase a start as you want to go on, because a lot of times we make decisions in the moment, but if we can think where do we want to end up, you know, then you can kind of stay on that path that's in that direction. It's very

Mel Lahr

26:59

interesting how it all unfolded. But at the same time, I still had my anxieties, I still got really zoomed in and like, Oh, what if they don't learn their math facts, but at the same time, I'd have the perspective of Luke and the support. And we'd be like, listen, we don't want them to be calculators. And they don't need to know facts. When we have Google. We're not looking for them to memorize knowledge and take tests. And we're looking at them to just be passionate and curious. But at the same time, all kids and all families are different. So I always try to say like, what's right for us, doesn't mean it's what's right for everyone, obviously, but I know that there is absolutely people out there who are homeschooling. And things aren't going well. And their kids are crying because they're trying to teach them to read and they're six years old, and you're like, I just want to be like, it's okay, Mama, like just step back. If our kids are raised in literate homes, with books, and we're reading to them, you're gonna learn how to read. I mean, it's really easy for me to say, because I've been doing this so long that I see my kids knowledge that I've never taught them. And right 10 year old taught herself how to read completely, like I could say, my 10 and six year old and even my 14 year old have all just always been unschooled. I've watched all of them teach themselves so much, and the things that they know and talk to us about it helps you just keep moving forward with this,

Candice McCoy

28:28

you're definitely in a good place where you can see kind of the fruit, like you said, I love how you really emphasize it's not about the traveling or the homeschooling or the unschooling, it's about just being in alignment and align school and not just going along with what's out this. You know, and

Mel Lahr

28:46

I know that sometimes that's easier for certain personalities and others, right? I already was okay, like doing things differently. I think that maybe being a single mom, so young, really, I was already so different, right? Like most people didn't have kids when they were that age. And most people were living differently. Every little thing that I did that was different, and then being comfortable with it and knowing that it was okay, because it was right with what's in here. It's been very emotionally freeing. I would say that my 20s I was fighting against it the whole time. And then my 30s have been all about living in my truth.

Candice McCoy

29:25

I love how you're taking that and you're putting it out there for the world because I know that takes a lot of work. And it takes a lot of intention and time to put out your experience. But I think it's really helpful for people. One question that I asked everybody that comes on has to do with the great wonder list and kind of what the mission of this whole movement is and the she who wanders podcast and series and it's just a lift the voices of all different kinds of women and moms who are passionate about not settling for the status quo, but creating their own reality and just living a vibrant life where they feel fully alive. So what is your great wonder Last are what makes you feel most alive.

Mel Lahr

30:03

I would 100% say that what makes me feel most alive is hiking with my family. And typically it's those hikes that have an awe inspiring ending, where we've all worked together. It's been maybe a tough hike yesterday is a good example, I actually took my two younger kiddos alone. And we hiked four miles. But the whole end of the hike was really steep. And my two little ones chose to go because I wanted to see this glacier. And we push through and then you get to the top and high fives we did this thing together, we accomplished it and look at our reward. It's so beautiful. When you get out and you start a hike. It's not like going to the gym and lifting some weights, you get to stop whenever you want. Well, on a hike, you have to keep going. And so teaching my kids that they can push through the hard things because the reward is worth it. I don't know, it's just life giving,

Candice McCoy

31:04

we have a little bit of rapid fire is where are you off to next?

Mel Lahr

31:09

We are headed, we're still in Canada, but we are going to start making our way south to Southern Utah for football. So we have some cool stops on the way. But we will spend three months doing football season and a really great part of the country. I'm not excited about getting there in late July, it's gonna be really hot. But that's okay. Yeah,

Candice McCoy

31:28

we did Utah in July, a couple years ago. And it's it was intense, but it'll pass

Mel Lahr

31:32

we have really enjoyed the three months in Greece, we would love to go someplace tropical this winter, where we can jump in warm ocean waters.

Candice McCoy

31:40

So number two is where would you love to spend a day wandering?

Mel Lahr

31:45

It's so hard because as soon as you start traveling, then all of a sudden the whole world opens up. And so at first we had this goal of seeing the lower 48 Well, we finish that last year. And now it's like okay, well, we want to go everywhere or Lin Norway, Iceland doing that sort of stuff in the summer is definitely a goal. And Ireland has always been on my list. That would be great to get over there. And like vanlife that I mean, we we could live on a sailboat next. I mean, we have like in terms of fear and anxiety, I've come so far.

Candice McCoy

32:22

So that's interesting to hear that over time of continually exercising that muscle, those things have gotten easier to handle and been and just become a little bit less the fear and anxiety that comes Absolutely

Mel Lahr

32:35

I mean, I still practice meditation, and I do something called tapping in the morning, that is a form of meditation, do lots of things to kind of like, just calm my mind. And especially when you're living in a small space with kids, but also the doing of all the things right these things, like you said, practicing and using that muscle very much

Candice McCoy

32:58

I deal with anxiety and I practice a lot of rituals to keep myself in the right headspace. So is there other you said the tapping and what else? What are the other things that are kind of your go twos for keeping yourself in that positive headspace tapping,

Mel Lahr

33:10

there's actually an app for tapping and you can learn how to do it on YouTube. It's really ideal for me, because I have a very, very busy mind. I think that goes with being just a dreamer. But I'm constantly thinking about 1000 things. And so meditation was very hard for me, I had to have a really quiet space. No kids talking. I mean, you live in an RV, there's no place to really meditate, that's quiet, I had to like, and I practiced really hard. And so doing the tapping it kind of like is connecting both sides of my brain, and really getting me to focus and move through and process the stuff in a different more present. Like I'm more present. So it's, it's super helpful. Well, the Tapping Solution app,

Candice McCoy

34:00

okay, I'm gonna have to look that up, because I've heard of that before, but I've never really dug into I do a lot of meditating. But I've never really dug into the tapping, but I can see how it'd be really helpful connecting the physical with. Okay, what is it favorite book recommendation that you've loved or that has had an impact on you. So I

Mel Lahr

34:16

love books, I'm gonna go back to the thing that started all of it and say that free to learn by Peter Gray. It's a very short book, but it talks about all of his GLCM in Psychology Today. He writes articles. He's done tons of research on kids and how they learn and the book free to learn is exceptional. It's what helped give me the confidence to on school

Candice McCoy

34:38

and who inspires you to dive deeper and to travel and or life

Mel Lahr

34:43

anyone living life differently and doing things differently? is definitely inspiring me to keep moving forward. And I think in the beginning, it was super helpful. So listen to this podcast, this she who wonders podcast Yeah, oh, Your lawn, listen to the podcast, get some confidence as other people are doing. If I'm doing it, you can do it. 100% believe in you. Yeah,

Candice McCoy

35:08

yeah. I love that. That's so good. So good. Well, I know that a lot of people listening are gonna want to connect with you, whether they're interested in RV Life or whether they're just trying to find their path and want more inspiration from people like you who are really living your best life. So where can people find you what's the best place to connect with you online? Oh,

Mel Lahr

35:29

we are on Instagram is where I started all of my travel sharing focus. So my, we are at Lars with latitude la H r S dot with dot latitude. But we're Lars with latitude everywhere. So you can find us on tick tock, we're on YouTube. But we actually have a blog, where I'm trying to share more detailed posts about the things to do in areas, we just really want to help inspire families to get out there and travel no matter if it's for small periods of time. We're very nature focused. But we also do things like museums and stuff. And I try to share everything and itineraries and guides, so that I've tried to make Instagram. So it's not so instant, and it's more Evergreen. And the people that do like go back and like click on our guides for an area or highlights, I get messages from two years ago, places we've been and they're like, thank you so much. This helped us with our Yosemite plans or whatever. So it's very, it's very cool to see that people are, are using those itineraries and getting something out of it. Because to make Instagram evergreen has been a feat.

Candice McCoy

36:39

I mean, that's an impressive goal, honestly, because it's kind of generally thought of as the opposite of that, but I feel like you're doing a good job, because your guides, I mean, I don't feel like that feature is really utilized a lot by a lot of people, I don't see it a lot. But with you guys, your guides are really, really good and in depth. And I know I did a deep dive on your unschooling guide. And it just, you know, we're not even fully in unschooling, but it gave me some ideas and some different ways to think about that, and just some elements of it to incorporate into what we're doing. And so I would definitely recommend anybody who wants to travel, you know, wants to look more into alternative education, ideas to go check out those guides, because they are really well done. And just really informative and helpful. So

Mel Lahr

37:26

thank you so much. Yeah, I remember. So I think the reason the guides aren't used that much, and even highlights is they're not going to grow your following at all. Yeah. So they're really honestly just bringing value. And I think that was our whole mission. It's not to gain followers. It's just to bring valuable information to those people who really are looking to be educated and inspired. So yeah, so we focus on those things rather than pumping out three meals a day.

Candice McCoy

37:53

Yes, I Oh, and I mean, again, talk about more fulfilling Oh, yes, pumping out reels is? Oh my gosh, it can be it can be exhausting. Well, that's so good. Well, I'm so thankful that you came on the podcast. I'm so glad that we were finally able to connect after all these months. And just to be able to share your story is such an honor. So thanks so much for coming on. Thanks, Candace.

Mel Lahr

38:15

It's been a pleasure.

Candice McCoy

38:21

If this podcast impacted you maybe gave you a new perspective or made you think differently about something I would love to hear from you. Take a screenshot or share and tag me on Instagram. I'd love to connect. And if you'd like to help us grow the reach of these conversations, be sure to subscribe to the she who wonders podcast wherever you listen, and I'd be so grateful if you'd leave us a podcast rating and review. Until next time, keep wandering

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