Central America-Honduras, Belize and Mexico-Deja Blue
Land · Air · Sea · The Power of Now
The ElixirWork Is Prayer
A nautical odyssey through solitude, ships, multinational identity, time wealth, and the transformation that begins when the journey itself becomes home.
A Universe of Stories
Consecrated by the Ocean
My universe is made of stories, not atoms: land, air, sea travel, and the power of now.
If I wanted to become a multinational soul, I could not do it in cities where I taught English—New York, Los Angeles, Paris, or Tokyo—alone.
I needed to be consecrated by sailing on the oceans.
The Opening Equation
Story + Movement + Ocean = Multinational SoulThe Sacred Silence
Solitude Sailing Through the Fjords
It is a wonderful thing to get rid of everything and everybody and go somewhere you do not know anyone.
“God's one and only voice is Silence.”Herman Melville · As preserved in the field note
If Hollywood is loneliness under a Hawaiian palm tree, happiness is solitude sailing through the fjords.
Ship Happens
Monotony Tinged with Hysteria
Living on a ship might be summed up as monotony tinged with hysteria.
It is not real life but an alibi. It is like going out of your mind every day in order to come to your senses. A fool who persists in his folly becomes wise.
After ten ships—yes, ten—I no longer wanted to cast doubt on perfection: America.
As an Art Director and World Cruise Coordinator, the experiences at sea turned my can't into cans and leveraged my dreams into serendipity—a thousand unseen helping hands.
The voyage creates distance from the old operating system.
The distance creates space for a different identity.
The new identity becomes usable when the ship returns to port.
The Healing Ocean
The Accomplice of My Restlessness
Who does not love the sea? The beach is a place of healing and joy. Salt cleanses us. Sun embraces us in its warmth. The ocean heals the heart, mind, and soul.
Life is different there. Time does not move hour to hour but mood to moment.
Yet the sea has never been friendly to me. At most, it has been the accomplice of my restlessness.
There is no cure for this curiosity. Television is an eraser. YouTube and Blogger are paintbrushes.
My leap of faith to go on ships was recreation, re-creation, and reinvention.
From Material to Time Millionaire
Resourcefulness, Not Resources
Money is not the root of all evil. Boredom is the root of all evil—a spiritual anorexia, the despairing refusal to be oneself.
The privilege of a lifetime is being who you are, once you let go of the life you planned and accept the one waiting for you.
Now that I did not need PowerPoint to explain my job, how much was I worth outside the W-2 world of nine to five?
I was a time millionaire. It was going to be about resourcefulness, not resources.
The Multinational Soul
Home Is a Feeling
I meet, therefore I am—a multinational soul.
I shrink, therefore I am part of, and apart from, American, European, and Asian culture.
The countries I visit and live in are as eclectic and restless as ports of call I inhabit for six hours or, at most, three days.
No man is an island. Yet after forty, land is seldom seen and you can count your friends on one hand.
I am an expat, yet not every country will do. Some countries fill the gaps. Others emphasize my expat-ness.
The cult of amateur wanderers is growing: global souls who have not been everywhere, but have everywhere on the list; people for whom home is a feeling, not a place in the soil but inside the self.
It's a Beautiful Day
Liberation After Losing Everything
The promotional material for “It's a Beautiful Day” describes a man who has lost everything and could not be happier.
It is, indeed, a beautiful day—a song about liberation. Clarity. I kiss the ground.
You've been all over and it's been all over you
It's a beautiful day
The Journey Itself Is Home
Basho on a Frequent Flyer Pass
Every day is a journey, and the journey itself is home.Basho · Adapted in the original field note
If the Zen poet had not said it more than three hundred years ago, I would have.
I am Basho on a frequent flyer pass, with complimentary mojo on takeoff.
Lessons from the Deep
No Yes in Yesterdays
Without risk, faith is impossible.
My leap of faith—to give up material things—was curiosity. The cure for ennui and boredom was “anyplace but here” and “I want to be surprised every day.”
I got paid in cash, visited beautiful places, had a hotel room, and six all-you-can-eat meals a day. If passengers behaved badly, a new group arrived every seven or fourteen days.
When you are perpetually cruising, you are what you are right there and then. People do not have your past to hold against you.
There is no yes in yesterdays on the road.
The Wanderer's Creed
One of the Privileged Homeless
I know both sides because I am both sides: a tourist who does not know where he has been; a traveller who does not know where he is going.
I have not been everywhere, but it is on my list.
I thought college was the longest vacation I ever took. This graduate-school semester became a kind of study abroad in nomadic pursuits.
I am one of the privileged homeless. Is there a new kind of person being created by a new kind of life?
Life Worth Watching
Better by Change
One day my life will flash before my eyes. I am making sure it is worth watching.
My life has not gotten better by chance. It has gotten better by change.
By changing nothing, nothing changes. When in doubt, I have always chosen change.
All these changes were preceded by chaos. The bridges I burned lit the way.
Yet at what point does choice—the watermark of individual freedom and self-determination—reach diminishing returns and become a problem instead of a solution?
That is the paradox of choice.
Dancing Lessons from God
Living on the Edge
My bizarre travel plans have been dancing lessons from God.
As soon as anyone starts telling me to be realistic, I cross that person off my invitation list. We remain friendly, but no longer friends, because they do not understand that if you are not living on the edge, you are taking up too much space.
There is no yes in yesterday. When you are sailing, you are what you are right there and then.
The Paranormal Path
Normal Is a Washing-Machine Setting
There is wise and otherwise.
When my left brain becomes too good at telling my right brain what to do, I am a normal man adapting to the world.
Otherwise, I am trying to adapt the world to myself. All my progress depends on becoming a paranormal man.
Normal is the setting on a washing machine—the spin cycle, the same old, been-there-done-that.
Paranormal is an art rather than a science. It cannot be easily explained or measured.
The Hero's Journey
If I Am Alive, It Is Not Finished
The test to discover whether my Hero's Journey on earth is finished is simple: if I am alive, it is not.
Remembering this is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking I have something to lose.
There is no reason not to follow your heart.
From Cozumel to Honduras aboard the Allure of the Seas—the largest cruise ship on the water in the original field note—the journey kept becoming the work, and the work kept becoming prayer.
The Final Equation
Risk + Movement + Reflection = A Life Worth Watching