This is what I learned from paragliding with my Uber driver and a stranger from the internet.

We never know whose life we’re impacting, and how they might impact ours. It's with our choices that we can turn ordinary days into extraordinary ones.

Life’s best moments are the unexpected ones. The ones that don’t require planning, they just happen. The ones where in the midst of them you smile to yourself in disbelief of it all. 

I had one of those moments this summer when I found myself paragliding in Colombia with a stranger I met on the internet and our Uber driver. This experience proved to me the best things in life are outside our comfort zone, and that we all have within our power to make an ordinary day, extraordinary. 

This story ended up not being about paragliding itself. It’s about the new friendship of three people who otherwise would have never met. It became about the moments we shared together. The lessons we learned from each other. The reminder that we can go out and seek friendships, seek experiences and make them meaningful.

It started when I decided to leave the US for three months and work remotely in Mexico and Colombia. In August I found myself in Medellin working from internet cafes during the week by myself and going on solo runs. It was tricky to meet people because we all mostly stared silently at our screens in cafes or talked with people across the ocean on Zoom. I couldn’t count on running to make friends either because there were no public running groups. Here I was in an incredible country with no relationships with the people nearest to me.

One weekend the adventurer in me wanted to go paragliding. But I wanted to share this experience with other people and I hadn’t made friends. Determined not to do it alone, I took to the corner of the internet most likely to have people with adventure-filled spirits— the Yes Theory online community.

I posted a shot-in-the-dark message on their worldwide Discord channel, hoping someone lived in Medellin. Miraculously within 5 minutes, I got a ping. A stranger named Juan said he’d be down to join.

What’s better than two strangers going paragliding together? Three. So, we asked our Uber driver, Diana, to join us. Without hesitation, she said yes.

Little did we know Diana was terrified of heights, but she said yes to face that fear. She shared that her father and brother had passed away a year earlier and her husband took his own life two months earlier. She spiraled into depression and began driving with Uber because she enjoys talking with people. She said due to all the loss she’s experienced, each second of life is a treasure and we have to enjoy it. It’s what made her say yes to paragliding so spontaneously. 

The way I met Diana was that she was my Uber driver one night and we had such a great conversation that we exchanged contact info for future driving needs. So when my new internet friend Juan and I were looking for transportation to go paragliding, it occurred to me to ask Diana to drive us. And then it occurred to me to ask her if she wanted to go paragliding with us. 

Diana said when she got my text asking if she wanted to paraglide, she was transporting some radio executives who told her she was crazy if she were to accept my invitation. “She’s a stranger! Why would you go paragliding with her? It’s also so dangerous!”

She told me when she told her kids that a random stranger had asked her to go paragliding she was expecting them to tell her not to go. But on the contrary, they supported her and encouraged her to do it.

My new internet friend Juan was another story. He’s in his early 30’s and said he hardly checked the Yes Theory Discord channel and for some reason decided to check it that day. “I’d never seen anyone come to Medellin from Yes Theory so I was so surprised when I saw your post. Of course, I’d say yes to a spontaneous adventure!”

Juan is currently studying bond trading and had previously been in digital marketing. He spent time in Chicago running a restaurant and he’s traveled all over the world. We learned we both like the same books and share similar perspectives on the importance of getting out of our comfort zones.

We drove over two hours to get to the paragliding site. We talked the entire time, like three long-lost friends. There was no awkward chitchat. We went straight to the deep talks. How could three people with entirely different life experiences and ages find such common ground? 

I smiled to myself at the incredulousness that our lives had somehow intersected. Here we were, strangers in a car on the way to go paragliding. We talked about books, happiness, health, death, tattoos, travel, and politics. About the importance of being open to learning from others. About doing what brings you joy and growth.

They asked me where I got my spirit of adventure and courage to do things with strangers. I said strangers are just friends you haven’t met yet. I shared that groups like November Project and the running community back home are what flipped my switch to being open with people and making friends. Running brought me out of my introverted shell and helped me practice talking with strangers. We are all just human after all.

The three of us formed a deep bond with a shared adrenaline experience of paragliding. A reminder we can create our own adventures. That we never know whose life we’re impacting, and how they might impact ours. Three people who seemingly wouldn’t have ever crossed paths— once strangers and now friends.

As she dropped me off, Diana got teary-eyed. She said she had no words to express how meaningful this experience had been in her life. How the moment her feet left the ground when we paraglided, she felt all her sadness and despair leave her. She felt free. 

And after our adventure-packed and friendship morning, we each went about the rest of our work days fueled by enthusiasm and joy. One a bond trader, another an Uber driver, and myself. Most of all we all became better humans for having met.

The next day I get a message from Juan. “I want to get into running. Where do I start?”

I hope you enjoyed this story and that next time you have the chance to go do something fun, figure out how you can involve other people. You never know - you might make a new friend. If you’re new to this newsletter and liked reading this, I invite you to subscribe!