Life to the Fullest: Lessons in Connection from a Summer of Travel

Hey there! My name is Lexi Zuck! 

Gracie has been a sweet friend of mine for years, and I’m so grateful for how we’ve gotten to walk and grow alongside each other through different seasons of our lives at SMU and beyond. I’m also so grateful for how she has graciously invited me to engage this beautiful online community that she so intentionally cultivates by allowing me to share my own story-in-progress with all of you amazing people! I hope this post is helpful and timely, especially as the year is drawing to a close and we’re all reflecting on what matters most. 

As Gracie knows, I love life and wholeheartedly believe in living it to the FULL! As an extroverted enneagram seven, you can probably guess that one way I like to fill my life is through the thrill of travel. I love to travel! I love the excitement of navigating new cities, engaging unique cultures, and learning from diverse communities of people. I love how travel leaves me with fond memories to look back upon as well as leads me to learn new lessons to glean from going forward. As a believer in Jesus, I especially love travel because it also grows me spiritually through allowing me to experience Him in fresh and distinct ways apart from my regular rhythms and routines at home. Needless to say, for these reasons and more, the prospect of traveling never fails to entice me!

That said, the summer of 2024 was the summer of my dreams. I was in transition between jobs with enough savings and margin in my calendar to say “yes!” to whatever opportunities to travel came my way over four full months from May to August. During this time, the Lord graciously opened doors for me to embark on some of my biggest adventures yet that grew me in ways I didn’t expect. Here’s a quick overview of what these four fantastic months entailed:

May brought me first to Lake Tahoe, Nevada to kickstart my summer with quality time with my parents. Shortly after, I was off to Chicago, Illinois to attend the wedding of one of my close friends. This was followed almost immediately by a short road trip to Fredericksburg, Texas for a Hill Country getaway with my roommates and good friends. Finally, I flew to Rosemary Beach, Florida to celebrate my 25th birthday with ten of my besties on the emerald coast. 

June took me first to Jaco, Costa Rica for a week-long mission trip with my cousin where we served together and befriended the most amazing family from Houston. Not long after, I crossed the north Pacific ocean to hop between three Hawaiian islands for two weeks where I savored the simplicity of island living and had the joy of witnessing the beachside engagement of one of my best friends to the love of her life!

July began with a short road trip to Independence, Texas to celebrate the Fourth of July with the wonderful family who my cousin and I met and grew close to in Costa Rica. After that trip, I went back to Lake Tahoe, Nevada along with my parents, brother, and extended family. Following this, I flew directly across the country to Santa Rosa Beach, Florida to celebrate one of my friends at her bachelorette party. Finally, the last two weekends of July were both spent on two different trips to Colorado– first a quick getaway to Colorado Springs with my boyfriend, followed by a solo road trip to visit several friends in Denver. 

August started strong with my mom and I flying to Punta Mita, Mexico for a long weekend in which I enrolled in a beginner surfing intensive. A few days later, I hopped on a plane to fly halfway around the world for a two-week journey traversing three countries in Southeast Asia with a good friend who shares my same love for spontaneous and outrageous adventure. Finally, my fourth and final month of traveling came to a close with another long weekend at the beach in South Padre Island, Texas with a big group of my best friends to celebrate one of my roommate’s birthdays! 

Looking back on my summer of travel, adventure, and exploration, I feel so grateful!!! It’s not an exaggeration to say that I genuinely enjoyed every moment of each unique experience in each unique destination, even with all the highs and lows that travel inevitably entails (as an example, after standing in awe at the magnitude of the Taj Mahal, I may or may not have puked in one of those little white bags in the back of the seats on an international flight but I’ll save you from the gory details). I'll cherish each adventure and all the memories made over the summer for the rest of my life, BUT GOD DID SO MUCH MORE than just give me a summer of adventures and memories to cherish. Although I fully anticipated that the Lord would grow me in new ways during my travels, I had no idea that the primary thing He would show me is that living life to the fullest actually has nothing to do with travel at all. In fact, it has nothing to do with doing at all. 

Over the summer, God showed up to show me that life is best lived being present in the moment to be able to experience authentic connection at all times! 

As my trips accumulated and the summer months progressed, I began to realize that no matter where I was around the world, there were always opportunities for authentic connection all around me. It didn’t matter if I was alone, among good friends, standing before a wonder of the world, or simply wondering about what type of clouds were in the sky above me. Over and over all summer long, I experienced authentic connection in a sundry of situations and scenarios, leading me to recognize that true connection doesn’t depend on where you are physically, but rather where you are in relation to yourself, others, nature, and God. I’ll explain.

First of all, connection begins with knowing ourselves. I learned that taking the time and giving yourself the space (and grace) to get to know who you are and what drives you is essential to connect with, well, yourself! The parts of my summer spent traveling solo– or even just time that I spent intentionally alone– was so helpful for me to reflect and connect with myself to make me even more confident, and excited, about who I am, what I want, and where I’m heading. It surprised me to realize that some of my most memorable moments of connection over the summer were not when I was surrounded by a large group of joyful friends or among packed crowds, but in the quiet introspection of my own thoughts and feelings. It occurred to me that in my regular rhythms of life, I don’t give myself enough margin to simply sit with myself. We all have the potential to grow into the best versions of ourselves: completely whole, free, and driven to do what each of us are uniquely wired to desire and accomplish with our lives. It takes intentionality to know oneself in order to dream and step forward towards these goals and aspirations with determination and resilience. This doesn’t just happen automatically, though, which is why we can’t just live our lives on autopilot. We all need the margin to discover our motivating passions, limiting fears, past hurts, future hopes, and highest callings. Often, this requires dedicated time set aside for silence and solitude regardless of where you are— at home or on the go— because if you don’t know who you are or who you want to be, you’ll miss out on the beauty of becoming secure in your individuality and consequently limit yourself in your ability to authentically connect with others. 

Next, connection leads us to know others. Like I mentioned earlier, I’m an extrovert, so socializing and connecting with others usually comes fairly easily to me, so naturally I was looking forward to the trips I had planned to spend good time with friends and family. However, over the summer I began to realize how much deeper, more life-giving, and more joy-filled connecting with others felt to me the more I felt connected to myself. I believe this is because it’s only once we truly know ourselves that we can actually look beyond ourselves to know others, be known by them, and make them feel known. It is a privilege to know someone and be known by them. There is freeing power in vulnerability. I have both witnessed and experienced this. It takes security and grace to allow someone to be fully themselves in your presence without pretense, and there is joyful affirmation and healing in being seen, heard, and received for exactly who you are. This is a free gift we can all give to others around us! All it requires is that we actually take the time to consider others and lean into their lives with genuine curiosity and compassion. When we approach knowing people around us in this way, it can feel the same to them as being loved. On the other hand, if we stay wrapped up in our own worlds, it can leave people around us feeling unseen and unknown. It is good to know yourself, but it is even better to know yourself well enough to know others selflessly because this gives grounding perspective that the world is bigger than ourselves. In fact, the world is bigger than ourselves and others and offers all of us authentic connection too. 

Connection is enhanced through experiencing nature! I chose to travel to certain places this summer specifically because of the type of nature that I knew would await me there, such as the seemingly endless Hawaiian beaches and countless waterfalls or the breathtaking views of piercing blue water and skies from the hundreds of hiking trails around Lake Tahoe. Trip after trip, I realized that experiencing the euphoria of personal connection through knowing myself and knowing others was always amplified when I got to co-connect with others in nature. I believe there’s something ingrained within all of us to connect with nature, and in a way it helps us to connect better with ourselves and others around us. After all, we’re all living on the same planet and have more in common than we might think! There is beauty everywhere that calls out to all of our senses to savor and enjoy– everything from the rising and setting sun to the wonders of the world to the seemingly endless diversity and beauty of plants, animals, and ecosystems. This summer, I learned to slow down, breathe deep, enjoy the view, and simply accept that pictures will never do it justice. It’s almost like nature is meant to be enjoyed together and unplugged. The world is enormously grand, and this reminds me that I am immensely small. This perspective is not only humbling, but it’s reassuring to me because the complexity and intricacy of everything in existence fills me with hope and confidence that everything in my own life will also work out in exactly the right way and season. I’m led to believe this because I trust in the Creator of all things.

Finally, God connects all things together. Throughout my travels this summer, all that I learned about myself, others, and nature led me straight to God. Whether or not you know the Lord personally, hear me out! I want to humbly submit to you the conclusion I came to that if you only ever connect with yourself, others, and nature– even deeply– you will still be left unsatisfied. Connection fuels satisfaction. Through all the unique opportunities I had for connection over the summer, I became convinced that ultimate satisfaction is not just found deep, deep within ourselves; it’s not even found by surrounding ourselves with the best of people; it’s also not awaiting us at the end of a 16-hour flight around the world to an exotic destination we’ve never been before. It has nothing to do with your relationship status, number of followers, or physical address. The deepest, most satisfying connection you will ever experience is available to you right now in this very moment with God Himself. The reason for this is because God, through Jesus, connects all things in perfect harmony. As it says in the Bible, “But for us, There is one God, the Father, by whom all things were created, and for whom we live. And there is one Lord, Jesus Christ, through whom all things were created, and through whom we live” (1 Corinthians 8:6). In other words, He’s the One who created you and me and everyone else in this world for a personal and satisfying relationship first and foremost with Himself. In His kindness, He also gave us our bountiful earth to explore and enjoy alongside other beautifully created beings. This summer, it finally clicked for me that connecting with these other things are all good gifts from God that He wants us to enjoy, but they will never be able to take His place. Authentic connection with the One who created you is the only thing that can ever satisfy you in fullness and equally empower you to experience the fullest joy in connecting with everything else when it’s all ordered rightly, namely that “He is before all things, and in Him all things hold together” (Colossians 1:17).

If you’re interested in experiencing this type of centering connection with God that enhances and heightens your connection with everything else, then I have good news for you! Connecting with God is simple. The only requirement is this: be His kid. Seriously, that’s it. He says whoever would enter the Kingdom of Heaven must become like little children (Matthew 18:3). This is good news because if you think about it, there’s no one more needy, messy, or curious than a kid. Beyond that, if you really think about it… who is more honest about what they personally want, think, need, or hope for than kids? Who is more inclined to look past the quirks and wrongs of others and move towards them in love and forgiveness than kids? Who enjoys playing outside, exploring nature, and experiencing the world around them more than kids? When you think about it in these ways, kids are really the best at connection! This makes sense why God asks us to come to Him with these qualities of authenticity and openness.

If it feels unnatural to think of yourself becoming like a little kid to come to the Lord and connect with Him, let me remind you of the simple truth that GOD LOVES YOU. He loves all of you. All your wants, fears, mistakes, desires, needs, and dreams are safe with Him. As a beloved child created in His image, you were made to connect with Him. Read it below for yourself: 

“Even before he made the world, God loved us and chose us in Christ to be holy and without fault in his eyes. God decided in advance to adopt us into his own family by bringing us to himself through Jesus Christ. This is what he wanted to do, and it gave him great pleasure. So we praise God for the glorious grace he has poured out on us who belong to his dear Son” (Ephesians 1:4-6). 

As you read above, living in the reality that you are God’s beloved child is really the most natural thing in the world! This summer I learned that you don’t need to travel to the ends of the earth to experience satisfaction because all-satisfying connection with God can happen for anyone, anywhere, anytime because He loves everyone, everywhere, all the time. He’s with you even now as you read this sentence, whether you’re in the middle of a once-in-a-lifetime expedition or going about your everyday routine in your hometown.

I thank the Lord for leading me on many amazing adventures this summer, but I’m even more thankful for the lessons He graciously taught me about connecting with myself, others, nature, and Himself through simply being His child. The prayer I pray for myself, and each of you, is that we will experience deep connection all around us and find our ultimate satisfaction, purpose, and joy through belonging in our Father’s perfect family. In light of this, I can confidently say that I'm entering this next season of life with a heart full of contentment, gratitude, and zeal to keep living exactly where I am in every moment to seek and cherish the opportunities for connection all around me. I invite you, friend, to join me in embracing the moment and enjoying the connection all around you, too.

Bio: I’m Lexi! I’m living my best life in Dallas, Texas after graduating from SMU with degrees in Engineering Management and Math! I love spending time with my family and friends, lifting heavy weights, and reading good books! I’m also passionate about volunteering with and advocating for kids in foster care and people with special needs. Above all, I’ve found my true purpose and identity through knowing and being known by Jesus Christ my King!