Possessions – Traveling Mark

What Will You Think Of On Your Death Bed?

Fight and you may die. Run and you’ll live. At least a while. And dying in your beds, many years from now, would you be willing to trade all the days, from this day to that, for one chance, just one chance, to come back here and tell our enemies that they may take our lives, but they’ll never take our freedom?

— William Wallace’s speech to the troops in the movie Braveheart

Happiness is a Journey, Not a Destination. Many a wise man said it before me and I have foremost respect for everyone who gets to understand the real meaning of it. If you put focus on a retirement, you’re putting focus on a destination, robbing yourself off the opportunity to savor the journey, aka every simple moment of every single minute. But don’t get overly content when you grow enough to stop focusing on a destination. At the end of the day, it’s not the pictures you took that matter, no matter how sparkling they are. At the end of the day, it’s also not that amazing social networking update that you had posted that matters, even if it results in hundreds of replies praising you for amazing thoughts.

Photo: What Will You Think Of On Your Death Bed?

I know a man who spent more than half a year in a coma after a blood clot blocked the flow of oxygenated blood into his brain. Young man, a biker, he was strong and athletic. A cool guy, good friend of mine from back home. Doctors had to remove a quarter of his skull to operate on his brain. He’s out of coma now but doesn’t know how to talk, doesn’t know how to walk – he’s learning things you would not expect a man in his 30’s to have to learn. Doctors say he’s lucky to be alive and to still be more or less himself after such a long time in a coma. Up until recently, not many believed he’d ever talk again.

Having known him well, it was hard for me to comprehend the fact that 30 years was all he got to say what he needed to say. He was magically back with us, but he couldn’t talk. Chances are, you who are reading this, like me, still have your means to voice your thoughts. Whether verbally, or through written accounts on the internet, your voice can be heard. How are you using it? What are you doing with the time you have? We all get a limited supply of time and when that bit of it that’s allocated to you runs out, what will your last thoughts be?

Will you think of all the pictures you took? Will you think of all the great articles you posted on the internet? Will you think of how that update you made got on the first page of your favorite social bookmarking site? Will you think of…?

Much of what is of utmost importance to you now, would quickly lose its spark if it was you laying in bed with tube sticking out of your mouth helping you to breathe. There would be people around you, talking to you, but none of them would know whether anything that’s being said is also heard.

You can take time to get to know the person on the inside, or you can continue to compete for attention on the outside. You can live a life true to yourself, or you can live the way others expect you to. You can spend so much time at work you’ll miss your children’s youth, or you can open yourself up to new opportunities and create unknown space in your life. You can realize that happiness is a choice, or you can remain stuck in the comfort of familiarity.

I now understand that we are constantly made to see all the things we are not. We literally piss away our precious life minutes by polishing our image in the eyes of others not realizing that we get none of them back. When you’re lying on your deathbed, will you be glad you spent life’s precious minutes doing what you did today?

Shredding My Life Away

As part of my commitment to cut down on the stuff I own, I went through a lot of paperwork which no longer had value to me or made no sense keeping. I had endless piles of credit card slips, cell phone bills, bank transaction records, official letters sent to me for various reasons and a whole lot of other paperwork I for some reason thought I needed to keep. There was a lot of it there in the boxes and since all those papers bore some form of personally identifiable information, I couldn’t just dump it in the garbage bin. So chunk after chunk, I would be taking a stack of paper with me to work, I would purposefully stay overtime, waiting for everyone to leave and then I’d proceed to occupy the shredder for an hour to shred all this paper I had brought. I kept doing this for a few weeks, day after day until all of the papers I no longer needed was gone. I have literally shredded my life away but it felt good. I have already been liberated from possessions, I just needed to take it a step further and liberate myself from paperwork.

Because of high volume of paper I had to shred, I had to split it into several days because the shredder would get filled up every day upon my use. I was hoping it would go without someone becoming too suspicious but luckily it went with no bigger issues. My life was shredded away. I was yet another step closer to becoming free. I have followed up by calling all of the institutions I still deal with to quit sending my statements by mail and strictly stick to electronic communication only. For one this is an important environmentally friendly step and secondly – I was not gonna be here to empty my PO Box anyway so the less unnecessary stuff makes it there, the better.

The Best Day of Your Life

I came to realize that the key to abundant life is to have the best day of your life every day. The best day of your life is the day you will never forget. If it instantly pops in your mind, then you know that truly was the best day of your life, if it doesn’t, if you have to think about it, then perhaps you have yet to have the best day of your life. If that’s the case, ask yourself this instead: “What was the best day of my life so far?”

I noticed that when I shared my intentions to quit work so I can travel with my friends, they mostly nodded in agreement and wished me the best of luck in my future endeavours, but the way they said it implied that they thought I must have gone insane. I was so excited about my future and so adamant about leaving work to travel that they have collectively showed support but their body language suggested otherwise. Their doubts were put to an end when I made a point by asking them to tell me what the best day of their life was.

Not surprisingly, the answers to the “the best day of your life” question usually revolve around particular experiences not related to workplace or possessions. It could have been when you went swimming with sharks, it could have been when you got a chance to hang out with your favorite band back stage, it could have been when you had your first parachute jump from a plane, it could have been… fill in the blank. People have the best days of their lives – days they will never forget when they are on a vacation or in their time off work engaging in their hobbies or spending time with the loved ones. This formula could be looked at from the opposite angle and we’d come to conclusion that safest way to ensure that today will NOT be the best day of your life is by going to work.

Life is supposed to be enjoyable and one should strive to gear towards enjoyment if it isn’t. Even if your past experiences make it seem as though the Lucky Fairy took a day off when you were born, you have all it takes to set yourself free from the shackles of employment. You only have so many days to live on this planet – doesn’t it make perfect sense that if at the end of the day you don’t feel like this was one phenomenal day with exiting new experiences and unforgettable adventures, that you have just wasted one of the limited number of days available to you doing something that doesn’t bring you enjoyment?

It matters not whether you are employed or your own boss. If you have to go to work because some potentially important client is expecting something or something otherwise essential requires your attention, then you are enslaved by your own work and your life is dictated by it. You don’t do what you want to do, you do what you must do. What would you rather be doing right now? Ask yourself that. If there is absolutely nothing you can think of that would bring you any more excitement that going to your workplace to deal with today’s workload and clients, then perhaps you are one of those cases who find spending their days at work more fulfilling than anything else.

Today should be a best day of your life, because you are getting ready to do something that you can’t wait to engage in. You are so excited you can hardly contain yourself, your adrenaline is through the roof and every cell of your body is in ecstasy. If you do not feel this way, then ask yourself what you would rather be doing right now. Think over the fact that your journey on this planet will come to an end whether you like it or not. You don’t know when, but it’s as clear as the sky that you only have so many days before it’s over. Every day at the end of which you don’t feel like this was the best day of your life should be a signal that the path you are currently following in life may not be the best for you. All of the unaccomplished things that will pass before your eyes as your life comes to an end will have been unaccomplished because you spend the time, time you have only limited supply of, chasing false dreams.

A false dream could be that house that’s in a good neighborhood and is currently for a good price. You put yourself in lifelong debt that will keep you enslaved at work, but you believe it’s a step up on your path through life. House, just as anything material is a possession. Just as it is with all material possessions, there will always be a chance to have a replacement. But you will never be able to get the time you have wasted chasing it back. Every second is there only once in your life. Once spent, it will never ever be back. The best days of your life will not be associated with possessions your have acquired. Just as employment or entrepreneurship will not make your day the best day of your life, acquisition of possessions provides false sense of achievement that’s supposed to enhance your life, but it just distracts you from what you really want .

Human psyche is an astounding thing and sellers of things know that. Advertisements are specifically crafted to mess with your mind and make you buy it. They make you believe you need that latest DVD player with Blue Ray technology because that’s the way of the world right now. I used to fall for it myself and ended up with so much stuff it was sickening. My life was about spending the best days of my life at work so I can buy these things and with each new purchase, I felt like I was moving further with my life. Was I in for rude awakening!

I quit chasing false dreams and instead of doing what I have to do today, I do what I want to do today. I understand that it’s not all about money. What would be the use of being a millionaire if the business that is making me rich requires me to attend to it every day to a point that I don’t even have time to unwind and enjoy myself. Think about the best day of your life. Think about what you should do tomorrow to make tomorrow another best day of your life. Make every day count. It’s your life and you only have so much time.

Liberation from Possessions

As recent travel re-ignited my barely burning spark of excitement, it was burning again, but still missing good fuel to burst into full flame. This fuel came in vast supply after I got rid of most of my possessions. I have not felt that liberated for years. Taking stuff that I owned and dumping it in the garbage bin was hands down one of the most liberating things in my life and definitely the most liberating since I got submerged in the corporate lifestyle.

I was so frustrated with my “Life in Boxes” situation, that I really wanted to settle in a stable place and live there so I can unbox and have access to all of my stuff for the first time in two years. The reason for my last move was the noise made by people living above me. I went to check my new place and it was in a quiet apartment building. I also liked the fact that the apartment building was for adults only. This meant there would be no screaming kids or obnoxious teenagers yelling in the hallways. Everything was suggesting that this was the place. I could not wait to move out of the noisy basement suite and when the day came, I rented an SUV and spent a long weekend moving to my new two bedroom apartment.

The moving was killing me already. It was a tough job and screwed over my entire long weekend again. Not to mention the cost of SUV rental and extreme amount of headache one puts themselves through moving. So when I was eventually moved, I felt the relief upon my skin, still shaking from the pains of recent move. I went to enjoy my first night in my new apartment, set myself a bed up, laid my tired head and body down, closed my eyes and went to have a peaceful night after months of extreme headache due to stomping roommates. What happened next was the biggest nightmare of my life.

I was tired as all hell and really needed a rest. I lay down and at that moment the people who lived in the apartment above me came home from a long weekend out. The noise they made was far worse than what I was getting from my previous roommates. What’s even worse, these people never quit. I was so tired I’d fall asleep standing. My eyes were so heavy I’d need pliers to open my lids up, yet the noise kept me awake whole night. I turned into a zombie and all of my faith in humanity was gone. I left one place to escape this stomping noise, went through extreme hassle of moving and worked day and night to move in three days only to come to the same and worse. I was ready to kill someone.

I basically realized that I can’t stay here. This noise was overbearing and there was too much of it. The following day I wrote up a letter introducing myself to the neighbours who lived above me and explained how hard it was for me last night with the noise they were making and how they didn’t quit whole night and asked them for consideration so we can all live soundly.

I dropped the letter off under their door and few minutes later someone knocks on my door. I open the door and there’s this absolutely gorgeous Asian girl standing there with my letter. I didn’t know what to say she was so gorgeous. I stuttered some incoherent crap and she left letting me know that her family faces the same issue as me as neighbours above them also make noise. I was devastated. I was defeated. I was broken, ready to quit on life. I moved six times in last two years. Because of that I was not able to unpack the stuff from my boxes because what’s the point of unpacking if I have to spend a week putting it back inside the boxes to allow for another move. And now after two years I thought I had found the place where I would be able to stay for a long time, so I could unpack my boxes and enjoy the items inside, but people living above me destroyed this hope in one night. My attempt to resolve it in a diplomatic way failed and I was left with nothing but tears in my eyes.

What happened next, however, was the most liberating feeling I felt since the beginning of my corporate lifestyle. I looked at the boxes which I have just moved in and said to myself – that’s it! I’m done moving it. I put a basket next to each box and went through stuff. Anything that I did not have in my hand in last two years went in the basket which I then dumped into the garbage bin outside. Anything I did not see an immediate need for went in the garbage. I didn’t care how expensive it was. I’ve dumped electronics, I’ve dumped jewelry, I’ve dumped merchandise I had for sale in my shop – I’ve simply dumped three quarters of my possessions without second thought.

After it was all dumped, I looked at the apartment which was before stuffed with boxes and now reasonably empty and felt an indescribable feeling of liberation. I felt as though a major burden I was crumbling under for years was taken off my shoulders. I felt like I could breathe again. I have liberated myself from possessions and it made me feel happier than I have felt in years.

My reasoning behind dumping everything was that it would not be worth the time trying to sell it. I imagined myself taking picture of each item I have, then posting classified ads about it. Some people would respond with loads of questions I would have to answer to give myself a chance to sell. Most would not go ahead with the purchase so I would spend a lot of time dealing with potential buyers who will not buy in the end. And what would I get? I’d end up selling way below reasonable value. So I’d be giving everything away anyway. When I took all that into account, I came to conclusion that amount of time it would cost me to post an ad and deal with potential buyers and amount of money I’d be able to recover per item would not be worth it. If I invested this time into something sensible, I could actually make decent money so why waste it in a stressful way? It just made no sense so dumpster it was. No second guessing – straight to the bin. If I look at my acting back then through the eyes of now, I feel extremely proud of myself. I now understand the value of time and how precious it is. I am glad I made it a priority over a couple of bucks these days and weeks of work I’d have to put towards potential sale would bring. Even before my awakening this undisputable understanding of my true self was there.

This whole dumping of possessions was kind of funny because I filled the whole giant bin outside in one day. I had to wait till dump trucks came to empty it and then I filled it again all by myself. I realized that other tenants in the apartment building would get angry with me for not being able to fit any of their actual home garbage in, so I waited each day until late at night to dump my possessions. Nobody saw who filled the dumpster so nobody knew whom to blame. I have filled it up like that several times. Dumptruck doesn’t come every day so my doing was responsible for crippling the garbage disposal abilities of all people who lived in the apartment.

This took place at the beginning of April 2009. It was before I went to Iceland, it was before I realized what corporate lifestyle did to me and decided to turn my life around. This liberation from possessions took place because I have had enough of moving my junk around and never even using it. Little did I know at the time that this small act would set me on my merry way to a better life. Yes, I still had the noise to deal with, but the thought of moving was not nearly as scary anymore. And now that I was free from most of my possessions, it has also become clear that when I turned my back on a leased car, it was the best decision I could have made.

My Whole Life Was in Boxes

After I had abandoned my photography business unable to compete against Walmart, I went to work for the government and since my former business was located over 100 km away from the government job, I decided to move. Not only is commuting 200 km a day costly, it also costs a lot in time spent. Hence it was not an option at all.

During my years as a business owner I have accumulated a great deal of possessions. Those included merchandise related to operation of said photography business, actual items that were for sale, lots of decoration for different seasons of the year, and crap loads of other useless junk I somehow felt appealed to buy when I saw it (corporate lifestyle ruled).

When time to move came along after I’ve been offered a job with the government, I packed it all up in boxes and moved to the new location I was going to call home. That however took place in the beginning of 2007. Edmonton underwent massive boom and rental prices went through the roof due to growing demand. Thousands of people from all over Canada flocked to Edmonton where economy was stronger than anywhere else in the country. There was more work available in Edmonton than there were workers.

With situation like that, there were no places for rent. Thousands of people looking, but everyone full up. Homeowners responded by hiking prices up ad nauseum. Since I have already left the notice with my old apartment, I had to leave, but I found myself in a deadlock. After two months of looking, I had no leads as everyone was simply full. It almost looked as though I was gonna end up on the street with dozens of boxes full of possessions and then I found a nice place the day before it would have been too late.

The place was nice, it only had a few catches. It was extremely expensive and was nowhere near conveniently located in relation to my workplace. I had to take it as that was the only available housing at the time. I asked my friend who has a van to help me move all of my boxes. We filled the van twice and moved most of the boxes that way, the rest I moved with my car. There was a lot of stuff in play, but it was all money.

Few months later, the housing situation in Edmonton has stabilized. Prices did not drop, but there was more availability. I took the opportunity and moved to a nice house with live in owner. He was a nice guy, the place was nice and it was close to work. I was happy. The owner let me use the garage where I have stored most of the boxes. The rest I filled up my room with. Life was pretty steady back then. I had little to complain about, other than the fact that there was no excitement in my life. I continued acquiring possessions as that is what you do when you live a corporate lifestyle. I bought myself a new, larger screen for the computer and 5.1 speaker system with awesome subwoofer that would bring any audio to life.

I stayed at that place for over a year and was surprised when the owner asked me to leave. I was happy there. It was close to work and no excessive noise to drive me insane when I’m at home. The reason why I was asked to leave, was that the owner, who had originally immigrated to Canada from Iran was able to get immigration papers for the rest of his family and needed his whole house so his parents and brother and sisters have a place. He recommended his friend and told her about me too. He was happy with me as a tenant, but the situation has developed in such a way that he needed his whole house for his family. I was unhappy about it, but had no other option. I still had my life in boxes and had to move all of them for the third time in a bit over a year.

I moved in with my former landlord’s friend at the beginning of spring. I was still driving at the time, but shortly after I moved to my new place, I bought myself a bicycle and started riding instead. This new place was on the 13th floor of an apartment building down town. Being downtown, it was again not close to my work at all and being on 13th floor, it made moving of all those boxes a major pain. I was pretty fed up with all that constant moving and was glad I had never unboxed cause had I done that, I would have to put it all back in the boxes in order to move. Keeping all I own in boxes had its advantages as it saved me a lot of time during moving, but it came at a price. You can’t find half of your stuff. You know you have it, you just don’t know which box it’s in. That forces you to buy what you already own. For example, you need a cork screw for your wine which I used to drink every evening (a glass of red dry each evening helped a lot with insomnia). I knew I had at least two of them, but for the heck of it I could not find them. They were in one of those boxes but each time I went through the content, I could not see any. So I ended up buying what I already had. Such is life when your life is in boxes. I also like burning scented candles and I knew I had plenty of those but rather than going through boxes, I opted for buying new ones. Corporate lifestyle which is all about acquiring possessions combined with life in boxes made for waste of money of unknown proportions.

Shortly after I had moved to the apartment on the 13th floor, I got myself a bike as my car was getting old and was becoming very costly to run and maintain. I made an attempt to lease a new car and had everything lined up, but it crashed and I ended up with none. Now I know this was one of the best things to have happened to me in a long time. But I’ll talk about it later.

I started riding bike to work. It was a 45 minute bike ride each way. I’m not a morning person so this forced me to get up earlier than normal in the morning so I could get to work in time on bike. Despite all that, commuting that way was enjoyable. Exposure to elements was making it tricky as some days it would rain like crazy, so I’d have to pack a set of extra clothes to take with me and change into them after I have arrived at work. Other days it would be so hot you sweat like crazy and stink whole day at work. Then it would get so windy you get to work exhausted as you pedal twice as hard but move twice as slowly.

But it was all good. I did it for a few months, until final element hit – cold. As soon as September came, it started getting brutally cold and biking became difficult. With each week it was getting colder and colder. Icy roads made for very unsafe biking and as you ride, you go against the air that’s freezing cold but feels twice as cold because you’re at a speed against it. I did it for as long as I could, but eventually had no other option but to move closer to work again. Driving my car was still an option, but it was the last resort. The car was completely busted, ate gas like crazy and didn’t heat up. It was still somewhat working, but it plain and simple sucked. I wanted to stick with riding a bike and it would be an option in winter as well, but not when your workplace is this far from your residence. 45 minutes of bike ride in summer equals over an hour in winter. It also becomes increasingly dangerous so it was just a question of time before something bad would happen. I had to move. Which meant I’d have to move all of my boxes with me AGAIN!

This time I found a place so close to work, I could walk to work in 10 minutes. I went through extreme pain of moving all of my boxes over to the new place all by myself (about 6 days of non stop work). The location was fantastic. I was so close to work, I was literally immune to any bad weather as I didn’t have to worry about traffic jams or cars not starting up. I could easily walk it to work in 10 minutes which was amazing.

This actually proved to be a heap of help as winter of 2009 was a tough one. It was extremely cold for extended periods of time. Whole December was below -30 Celsius. Then it gave us a bit of break and went down to beyond brutal again. Too many extremely cold days and these cold snaps also lasted for way too long. Not having to deal with any automobiles in weather like that was extremely beneficial. Sure it was beyond insane to walk for 10 minutes in such weather, but it could be done. On some days it got so brutally cold I had barely made it to work, but I’ve survived.

Unfortunately, I had really bad roommates in this new place close to work. I lived in the basement and the couple who lived above walked around like a herd of buffaloes. The noise was unbearable and never stopped. I spent Christmas suffering from severe headaches caused by non stop noise made by stomping of people above. I feared for my mental and physical health and had to leave as soon as I had a chance.

At this point I have already lost count over how many times I had to move my boxes from one place to another. I have been moving them around for so long, giving up on them was not an option anymore. In two years of working for the government I had to move 5 times and another move was imminent. Each of those times I had all of those boxes in my hand and each time the boxes were moved, they were just sitting there. Few essential items were at hand, the rest was just being moved in boxes. But the thing was – I have moved them around so many times yet never made use of any of it. I can’t give up on it now. If I were to get rid of any of it, I should have done it the first time I went to move. Subsequent moves would be so much easier. But since I haven’t done it, and actually went through eternal pain of moving each of them boxes around with me, I should continue putting up with it and wait until such time when it will pay for itself.

The breakthrough moment came with my last move. I had to leave the basement apartment asap because noise was just too much. There wasn’t much available at the time – everything was either extremely overpriced or extremely inconveniently located. Except from one place. It was a two bedroom apartment in a nice apartment building. It was reasonably close to work for convenient bicycle commute and reasonably priced: $850 for a two bedroom apartment. I figured I was gonna take it and find myself a roommate in which case the cost per person would become fairly affordable. So I went to move all of my boxes again. I had hoped this was the last time as having one’s life in boxes is extremely difficult and I was on the fringe of flipping from constant need to move them around.

Enter Corporate Lifestyle, Bring On the New Grumpy Me

As I gave it to the pressure from my family to quit being a wandering bum and get a job, I started to change. I did not realize that, as it was a slow-moving process, but gradually, bit by bit my mind was getting twisted by the corporate bs. I have fallen into the lifestyle of a working class slave who voluntarily participates in repetition of his day to day tasks. I did as I was told, I collected my wage, I paid my bills and repeated the cycle over and over again. Every now and again I would meet with my buddies over a beer, we’d have some laughs and do something cool, but overall I was a working class man who turned himself into a slave for the best part of the week so I could collect the pay at the end of the month and exchange it for things. The lifestyle of excitement has dwindled away, the lifestyle of collecting possessions took over.

Of course you don’t see it that way when you’re stuck inside that corporate cycle. I didn’t see it that way until a decade later, when I had a personal awakening and got a chance to look at my past 10 years from a distance. Deep inside I felt that something wasn’t right, but I couldn’t find a name for it and opted for denial instead. There were signs all around me, but I chose to ignore them. I know what kind of toll this lifestyle took on me. I was aware of that fact that I’m miserable and grumpy all the time and that I treat everyone like crap, even though I never used to be that way. I didn’t know why I started acting that way, but instead of looking for answers, I blamed everyone else. It was all their fault, everybody is in my way, everybody wants to take advantage of me, everybody is there to piss me off. That’s who you turn into if you take away excitement from your life and focus on a lifestyle based on possessions. Corporate madness will change you so you won’t even recognize yourself.

The further ahead you get, the more possessions you accumulate, the more you get yourself locked in place and dependent on possessions you bought. If you finance a car, you have years of payment ahead of yourself you can’t escape. If you take a mortgage to buy a house, you will sentence yourself to living in this town for a minimum of next few decades carrying the burden of debt. But the worst thing is – corporate lifestyle will wash you up so badly, you will believe in it. You will believe in the system and will see acquisition of each new possession as a step forward in your life. This gradual downturn will continue for as long as you see the light at the end of tunnel – retirement.

You will voluntarily allow yourself to become a corporate slave because of the vision that one day when you’re 60 or so, you will be able to reap benefits of your whole life’s hard work. You will see yourself with mortgage paid off, owning your cozy house with a nice car in a garage and grandchildren outside playing with your cat. You see this distant picture and it’s good enough to keep yourself voluntarily enslaved. The enslavement makes you grumpy and miserable, but you see possessions accumulating and you see the retirement coming closer, so you don’t give up.

I was exactly the same way and when I saw one of my colleagues retire, I thought she lead the perfect life.

Free to Travel

I used to travel a lot when I was in the university. Each summer I would hit the road with my thumb pointing up and would hitch-hike across Europe. I had no money back then. I just packed up my books and a few essential items and would throw myself on the nearest highway to go… somewhere. Those were the best days of my life. You get to meet so many other travelers – people from all over the world, who like you are wandering around with an open mind and an unceasing desire to explore other countries and experience different cultures for what they really are.

There’s a great deal of respect among travelers. It’s the parallel world where possessions mean very little and sharing is part of life. It’s because your everyday essentials consist of things that are above material possessions – it’s the air, it’s your dreams, it’s the sky above your head as you take rest in soft grass. Traveling enhances your spirit, it opens up your mind to be more receptive towards the others. It teaches you to see things differently for when you go hand in hand with nature, you set yourself free from the confinement of your own ego.

I know I have already said it, but let me say it again – those were the best years of my life. I was happy, every day was exciting. I had stories to tell and these stick with me to this day. I was doing things I enjoyed and cared about. My life was making sense to me and I felt I would never want to swap with anyone. I started with this lifestyle in my late teens and lived that way until my mid twenties.

But then something happened and I turned my life around. Something got to me and I have come to conclusion that I had wasted enough of my time wandering the world like a bum, that I should settle, get myself a job and start building something around me, something material so I can touch it and feel like I own something. Now that I look back at this almost decade long period of my life, I know that this was the darkest time of my journey on Earth. I try to think of it as a time I needed to go through in order to fully realize how important every second of your life is and how every second you don’t do something that excites or uplifts you is a second wasted and it can never be recovered.