I attempted to address this trepidation in What It's Like To Leave, but I might have been a little heavy on the narrative and light on the reassurance.
For tl;dr, scroll down to the heading "Strategies For Leaving"
This is for the growing /r/vagabond audience of people who are sitting at home reading these posts, imagining themselves in some future life on a romantic, dirty adventure tromping around the country or the world on a dime.
This is for the dissatisfied, middle-class, suburban-raised 20-or-30-somethings who have tasted "real life" and now feel cheated. The mind rests on your refrigerator and your paycheck and your commute and all those dull little moments spent waiting in tedious places; waiting to check little boxes that you didn't draw. Working hours to get paid to keep up this lifestyle that just allows you to keep working.
This is for the part-way-through college scholars who are trying not to think about student debt. You are wondering what you are doing, sitting here "learning;" You feel that there must be a different kind of knowledge out there, you imagine more and more how you could be spending your time more wisely.
I have been exactly where you are now. I left, alone, two years ago. Now I'm a Vagabond. /u/gatoradewade and his girlfriend were also where you are now. They left, with me, two weeks ago. Now they're Vagabonds.
A quick note, for the truly-oppressed: Many people who are living as full-time travelers have found their new life by escaping an old one. If you are being abused at home, if you are in a toxic relationship, if you are already experiencing poverty or homelessness, or if you are truly suffering and don't have the advantages and privilege that I'm addressing here, please know that there is a way out. You can move forward. This post and others on this page can absolutely still inspire and inform you on how to take control of your life, but please excuse me for addressing a wider audience of people. Some people choose live rough, some people are forced to live this way by their circumstances. My hope is that the information I post here can help people anywhere on that spectrum.
I still remember the feeling I had waking up for the last time in my bed, on Day 1, knowing what I was about to do. It was like a combination of every Christmas Eve of my entire childhood. That, combined with the nervousness of my first night in the back of a car with a girl, with the addition of a good knot in my stomach, just like the one I had when I ended up crashing that same car a few months later.
The catharsis and release I felt at the end of that first day on the road were deep. I still hadn't quite mastered the zen art of living in the moment, so I was worried about the future. Still though, Holly Crow I had done it! I had driven the car my parents bought for me to the end of town and left it. I had turned off the smartphone my parents paid for and left it in the car. I had taken my ridiculous, over-loaded pack and walked to the freeway, had gotten a ride, then another, and I've seldom looked back since then.
What does it take to get to that point? I'll lay it out for you.
Self-Honesty and The Cons
The classic movie cliche before making a big life decision is to make a Pros vs Cons list and weigh out one's options. There is a slight problem with this approach, however, because you don't really know the pros or cons of living on the road until you're out there. You have an idea. "I'll be free, I'll end my reliance on money, I'll see the world, I'll go where it's warm." For now though, you are rooted at home, and you take so much for granted that you won't know until you're away from that life.
A better way to tackle the question of "Do I want to do this?" is to evaluate your life in the broadest possible terms. Ask yourself how healthy you are, how truly happy and content you feel. Examine your lifestyle. Think about how much time you spend doing things you "have" to do (IE working, waiting in line, driving, doing chores, etc.) Next, reckon how much time you spend on things you "want" to do. This could be reading for pleasure, playing or actively-listening to music, playing with your pets, exercising, socializing, building things, cooking, any activity that you're passionate about that you do for its own sake, and for your own health.
Those are kind of the two main modes that most people think about, but there are unseen forces at work that drastically effect the quality of your life. The first is how much time you devote to your habits. This is where it gets a little tougher to be honest with yourself. How many times a day do you look at your phone? Are you becoming dependent on weed or alcohol or other drugs? Do you ever eat just because you are bored? How many shows do you keep up with on Netflix? How often do you masturbate? How big is your game library for your PS4? Have you ever driven your car when you could have walked or ridden your bike for the same mission? Do you find yourself avoiding social interaction or rejecting invitations from friends or family just to stay in by yourself?
Now evaluate how much time you spend helping other people. This might be what you do for a living, but that is still an obligation to make money. I'm talking about selfless acts done out of love for your friends, family, and strangers. When was the last time you called your mom? What do you do when you see trash on the street in front of your place? Do you stop and acknowledge and listen to crazy people when they ramble on to you on the bus? Have you ever volunteered your time with a charity organization? When you turn them down, what is your justification for saying no to pan handlers?
Okay, you made it. Hard part's over.
Shake it off. Take a deep breath. Maybe walk around a little bit and get some blood flowing.
This isn't about guilt, it's about opportunity. Those are all very real, every-day, in-your-face questions to think about. You're going to battle that grey realism with BRILLIANT SUNNY RAYS OF IDEALISM AND HOPE AND WONDERLUST.
You could be a traveler kid! You could put all this petty bullshit behind you and live for free and be sexy and well-cultured and interesting and exotic. You could go actually see all those things you've seen on TV and /r/earthporn with no one telling you how or when or why or whatever!
You could never mop or vacuum or scrub a toilet again.
You could sleep in every day because you have nowhere you have to be.
You could meet your true love and get a couple dogs and travel the world just sleeping in a van and having sex in the wilderness.
You could start making new friends and having such a cool freaking life that you don't even stop to post about it on facebook anymore! You don't need the satisfaction of showing anyone else, you're satisfied by what you're actually doing in the moment!
Preparations and Balance
So here's the reality. You could probably leave today. In fact, unless you are incarcerated you could definitely leave today. In terms of forces that would literally stop you from physically walking (or rolling) out of wherever you are and just going on until you got a ride somewhere, we live in a pretty free society. Nothing would be prepared for you ahead of time, and you'd be completely at the mercy of the world and reliant on your base survival skills and charisma to get by. Whatever infrastructure your life had before, including relationships and security and resources and obligations, your job etc. there would likely be some serious damage and loss of trust. You would likely suffer some hardships, experience some stuff you seriously didn't expect or even believe possible. You would be profoundly changed as a person.
The other extreme end of that spectrum is a weekend camping trip where you drive to a KOA campground with Wi-Fi and showers. You go have a fun little time roasting marshmallows and sleep on an air mattress in a tent or else rent an RV for the trip and get breakfast at Denny's on the way home. This is safe and relatively easy and the infrastructure of your life right now can likely handle it just fine. You'll come back to your routine on Monday and maybe think about some cool trees that you saw or maybe an awkward interaction with a person pooping in the bathroom stall next to you. Not much change there.
Successful vagabonding for you, dear frustrated yuppie, lies somewhere in the middle.
So once you decide that there might be a better life for you on the road, what do you do? Well, if you've arrived at this sub and are reading this post, you're probably part-way into the process already. The answers most people come up with are "research online" and "buy stuff."
I'm going to embrace those philosophies, and help them along a little bit. Try "research outside" and "use stuff." If you're looking someone to tell you what you'll need on the road, this isn't the right post for you. This might be the right post.
The true work for you lies in sorting out your life and giving yourself some momentum. You have to balance your current resources between making your way more easy and enjoyable when you're out there, and keeping the bridges to your past life from burning.
The hardest set of affairs to put in order before you leave could be your relationships with friends and family. They will be scared for you, and they will try to convince you not to do it. I don't even want to give examples of the kind of negativity and fear tactics I've seen people use to try to stop would-be-tramps from leaving. Don't let these voices get to you. Unless someone has been out there, they don't know what they're talking about.
This experience is not the same as being in the military, so don't let anyone make that comparison on you. You are not being lazy, you are not freeloading, you are not betraying anyone by leaving. If people bring up money, they are just struggling to understand that survival as a human being is not fundamentally reliant on an income. Be patient with them, and be honest.
You also are not disappearing forever. I have held a job and lived in several houses since I first started traveling. I have been there for family gatherings and holidays, and then gone back out on the road after. I communicate with the loved ones from my past life, and with friends and lovers I've met on the road. This experience will teach you an immense amount about who you are, and will eventually give you a greater capacity to love and serve the people to whom you are connected.
Hitch hiking, living in your car, hopping trains, volunteering with WWOOF, hopping on a boat across the ocean, walking or bicycling across the country, becoming a traveling musician; these are all activities which put you out of the control of those who are used to controlling you. When you come back to them, it will be on your own terms. If you are successful on the road, you will gain respect from the people who tried to talk you out of leaving.
If you are unsuccessful, you'll die of a heroin overdose or get hit by a train. Don't hitch hike at night, don't do drugs, and don't hop on the fly. It's pretty simple, folks.
-Strategies For Leaving-
Most of this is stuff that I blatantly failed to do before I left, partially because I was inexperienced, partially because I lacked self-discipline. You can benefit and learn from my mistakes.
Okay, rapidfire information. You ready?
--Give away as much stuff as you can. Selling stuff takes time and doesn't feel nearly as good. Do your best to let go of sentimental items that can't fit inside of a shoebox.
--Give "important" stuff to people you trust. This includes old ID's and your passport (if you're not leaving the country on your journey.)
--Be casual and confident and positive when you discuss your plans for leaving with friends and family. You want them to take you seriously, but not worry too much.
--Practice sleeping out before you are forced to do it with no backup plan.
--Test and use your gear. If you have complicated or delicate equipment, figure out how to use it before you leave.
--Carry your pack around with everything you think you're bringing (including food and water.) Yes, your back and shoulders will hurt after carrying it for a while, this is normal. You will get stronger. What you don't want is injuries. If your arms fall asleep because your straps are weird, or if you wrench your back painfully the third time you pick up your pack, slow down and make some adjustments.
--After carrying your backpack around, stretch. Daily yoga and just stretches that I've made up are a vital part of my health and success on the road.
--Practice and get used to a minimalist travel diet and learn how to feed yourself cheap healthy food. This one is so big. Try limiting yourself to a $3 per day food budget. You'll get creative fast.
--Get your finances in order, whatever that means for you. I took my last $300 in savings with me on the road, didn't spend it for 1500 miles, and then had it fly out of my pocket and disappear at a Devil Makes Three concert. Losing that cash was one of the best things that ever happened to me.
--Consider quitting your job in a creative way, especially if you hate it. Don't get arrested.
When the time comes, take a deep breath, grab your pack, and walk away. I can almost guarantee you will realize you forgot something and feel the urge to turn around. Resist it. Whatever it is, you can live without it.
Leave stealthily, because the people you live with might not believe that you're actually going to do it, and because they may try to stop you if they see that you're serious.
Leave a note. For me, that was enough to keep everyone off my back until I could get a few hundred miles away. When I finally called my family, they had gone a whole three days without knowing where I was or being able to contact me. They were grateful and full of joy. I never got grief for leaving, I got respect. You can go getcha some too.
Courage, Luck, and Water. That's all you really need. I'll see you out there.
Peaceably,
-Tall Sam Jones
Submitted January 10, 2018 at 04:12AM by PleaseCallMeTall http://ift.tt/2mk3HCx vagabond
No comments:
Post a Comment