3 Things I Learned from Driving in Japan

Living in Japan taught me so much about myself and what I was capable of. While I lived in Japan, I taught English and painted a lot of art. I would pile my artwork up in the back of my little car and go to art shows. I interacted with Japanese executives and improved my own conversational skills as I jumped into teaching English to people with far greater educations than my own.

The biggest challenge that I took on while I was living in Japan was learning how to drive there. This experience taught me several things that still impact me today.

1. Run toward the challenge.

When I moved to Japan, someone told me how confusing Japanese expressways are. They said that I would get lost. They warned me, telling me I would be better off to always take the train to go somewhere.

Go ahead and tell me I can’t do something because then I will do it. I wanted to learn how to drive on the expressways. I wanted to go even if I got lost.

So I learned how to drive in Japan. In fact, I drove all over the country. I drove up into the mountains and stayed in little villages where they served fresh soba with locally made shoyu drizzled over the top. I got hopelessly lost in the city of Tokyo more times than I can count. I even flew to the island of Okinawa, Japan, where I…