Bad With Maps

By. Thea Weiss

I have a strange, bad habit. It is this: Following the advice of loudspeakers. Six or seven years ago, my husband and I were running to catch the train in Berlin, Germany, back to our Airbnb. We’d just come from a nightclub painted with a big blue eye that never blinked. Inside, we’d enjoyed one too many an unnamed Pilsner, which made trying to navigate the 3 a.m. train schedule perplexing. 

My husband usually has the internal compass of a Yellowstone-bound Boy Scout, but this night was different. We were so very tired. 

“I think it’s this train,” he said, stepping up to a track. The stark gray creature hummed beneath the warmth of the lights as an announcement came over the loudspeaker. It said that the train to Prenzlauer Berg — where we were trying to go — was three tracks over. 

The voice was garbled and sounded like it could’ve just been out at the same nightclub we’d been to, shimmying along to Katy Perry’s Roar. But still, it emerged from a loudspeaker. Everything I’d learned in school told me that it had to have some authority. Right?

“Three tracks over,” I said. “Let’s go. And maybe we can grab a croissant along the way?”

“The croissant stand isn’t open,” my husband told me. “And I think it’s this one. This is the same number train we took earlier, and the sign said this track.” 

As if in answer to our question, a conductor with a kind, round face popped his head out the side of the train. We took the opportunity to ask him if the train was headed to Prenzlauer Berg. In perfect English, he told us yes, that this was the right train. Come on in.

We accepted his invitation, but I was still reluctant. The loudspeaker had said something else. Wasn’t that meant to be this train station’s overarching voice of Reason?

“What if this isn’t the right train?” I asked my husband as we found a seat. I longed to be back in the king-size bed. I wanted to get some rest so I could wake up and seize the day like Belle — cracking the doors to our balcony open and roaming the wide-open parks with joie de vivre. I wanted to feel myself fall into that deepest pocket of Sleep.

 “Well then that would be a memorable evening, wouldn’t it?” he said.

On the train, I might have fallen asleep on his shoulder. All I remember is waking up the next morning in the bed, fully rested. There were multiple croissants at multiple bakeries to be had, and Americanos, and a bustling flea market filled with future heirlooms, where skateboarders gathered and raw drums sounded.

 It was the most delicious day only because we got on the right train the night before. It seems like a simple thing, but I couldn’t help feeling grateful to my husband, and to that sweet conductor and his welcoming wave in. “Come on board,” he’d said. But I hadn’t wanted to follow his advice. Why?

 This is one of my biggest questions in life. Why am I more prone to follow the voice of the loudspeaker than the voice of the conductor? The conductor knows this train.

He’s already standing on the train. 

In life, we get a lot of messages. Many of them are external. They are things that other people want and hope for us or think would be a smart idea. Loudspeakers try to take the pen of our autobiography and edit the chapter a little. 

And then, we get a lot of messages from ourselves. Some of them are superficial, some of them are cruel, some of them seek to sabotage our success. But the messages from our conductor are the messages I’m talking about — the ones that rise from the gut. 

I’d always thought the phrase “go with your gut!” had an ultimate cheese factor until I got my first job at an ad agency. I had created some headlines as a copywriter — the short, catchy phrases that sell a product — and the review group sat around a table feeling which idea resonated with them.

“That one,” one of the creative directors said. “I feel that one in my gut.” I felt it too.

When I looked at the long list of words again, that was the phrase that I could almost physically feel in the core of my body — this little flame dancing or spark leaping up, saying “follow this.” To me, that delightful nudge is the voice of the conductor. The conductor knows which train I should be on.

The loudspeaker tells me I should continue to be a good girl. It says I should answer every text message in real-time as it is received so as not to offend anyone. It says to play it safe, for fear of getting hurt. It tells me to bowl with the bumpers on. 

The conductor tells me to dress in a way that could be interpreted as quirky aunt attire. The conductor begs and pleads for me to take big juicy creative risks. Schedule the show. Write the song. Outline the book. The conductor screams to set boundaries and that my needs are incredibly valid.

And when it comes to these messages, there’s one thing I need to remember: The conductor is already on the damn train. Only I know the user manual, the operating system, and the way back to Prenzlauer Berg — a gorgeous stretch of Berlin that is the perfect metaphor for this whole thing, by the way. I no longer want to live by someone else’s prescription of joy. I no longer want to hop on the loudspeaker train, the train that I’m told to take by someone else. I want to hop on the alive train — the one my conductor chooses. 

This is not an easy thing to do, because I never really learned to read my own maps.

 For thirtyish years, I relied on the loudspeakers to find the right train, saving the conductor rides for the late hours — the hours before bed, or the hours when I was all alone, strumming my guitar in my room.

 Recently, something shifted. And while I might not be great at navigating yet, I'm starting to listen for the faint call of the conductor. As I continue to ask the conductor which train to hop on, I believe the voice will only grow in volume, until one day, it drowns out the loudspeaker. Until the pit of desire in me, the rich, velvet dreams that I and only I want, are the ones that guide me. 

Thea Weiss is a brand writer and musician based in Denver, Colorado. She is deeply curious about the creative process and how to get past inner critics and roadblocks. You can find more of her work on Instagram @writtenbythea