Listen, I’m not good at sugarcoating stuff. I hate gray areas; I prefer the comfort that comes from knowing where you stand. So, You Might Die Tomorrow isn’t going to be a soft, gentle inspirational read. This is a book for people that want to wake the fuck up.
Read MoreI don't know why I'm smoking. Maybe it makes me feel like a writer.
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I've recently embarked on a round the world trip - my Soul Vacation, as I call it. Here's why I'm quitting my job and leaving everything to go explore a bunch of places I've never been to.
To Break the Habit of Buying Stuff I Don’t Need
I’ve gotten into the habit of, ‘I like it, I buy it.’ I even stopped paying attention to prices, which led to the fateful day in which I got home and realized I had purchased tortillas at Whole Foods for $9.99. Tortillas. For ten dollars. On the road, I’m forced to schlep everything I’ve got on my back, so I only buy things I really, really like and for which I’m willing to potentially get a backache. But it’s bigger than the backache: I’m conditioning myself to spend my money on experiences instead of things. That’s the stuff I’ll gladly schlep with me everywhere until I die.
To Learn New Things
To learn that people are mostly good. To give surfing a try. To do stuff I’ve never done that puts me outside my comfort zone. The collective experiences will either age the shit out of me or keep me forever young. Either way, I get to keep ‘em forever. I’ll gamble.
To Be Young Before I Look Old
I’m turning thirty-one in a month, guys. Lucky for me, people usually estimate 27...but that ain’t going to last forever. I've spoken with more than one older-than-I traveler who said it's lonely on the road for them, because they are often avoided by wary and likely immature young fellow travelers, and found it difficult to make friends. I like to think I can still pass as one of the ‘them’ in a group of drunk 25-year olds for a night just enough so they treat me as one of their own. Most of all, I don’t want to waste my youth and put off for my retirement what I want to do now.
To Fall in Love
What would a round the world journey be without a few broken hearts along the way? Falling in love is crazy fun, and I intend to feel heartbreak more than once when I have to push off for the next city and leave someone awesome behind.
To Be Alone
The other night I walked by a bar with a super fun live band playing and people dancing. So I went in, and after a few minutes of awkward internal debate, I started dancing. By myself. And I had the best freaking time.
Doing something solo is a huge confidence booster for me. It reminds me that I like me, and I’m a badass. It’s not easy, but it’s absolutely worth it. Want to give it a try? I believe there are three levels to solo dining badassery:
Level one: sit in the back and bury your face in your phone. It’s okay - this is your first time and you’ve got to ease into it. Level two: dine al fresco on the front patio, but bring a book and be fabulous. Level three - and this one isn’t for the weak, but will pay confidence dividends: Dine al fresco on the front patio, solo - no book, no touching your phone - just watching the world go by. Good posture is a key piece of the badass energy you’ll be projecting, so no slouching. Now go take over the world.
To Learn About People
And improve my empathy and understanding in the process. I’m one of the first generations to grow up in the Information Age and the 24-hour news cycle. Images, videos, news - they’re everywhere All. The. Time. I’m afraid I’ve become desensitized to the stuff I see on TV. I’m desperate for the real world. So I’m going out to see it for myself. I believe that people with difficulties appreciate sympathy but really value understanding. They want to be treated as people. So instead of eating everything on my plate to save the starving children of Africa (mom), I’m going to go say what up to people who have less and live differently than I do, and get to know them and their story.
To Do the Thing Now I’ll Regret Forever If I Don’t
You might die tomorrow. You never know. I had it in my head that I’d travel around the world when I retire. But what if I don’t make it? I decided to take control of my life, align with what I feel in my soul, and do this thing now that I’d regret forever if I didn’t. It feels incredible.
What’s the thing you’ll regret if you don’t do? Do that thing.
I realized one thing I'd regret on my deathbed if I hadn't done it is travel around the world. So, I'm doing it. Because I could die tomorrow, right?
Everyone always looks at me aghast, "So you're doing it alone?" Well, yes. I figured if I waited around for someone to do it with me, I'd never do it. But it turns out lots of people - including you, probably - are looking for an excuse to use up those vacation days somewhere incredible, and to travel with someone awesome (that's me) for awhile. So the door is open. Where will you meet me?
February - March 2016: Australia | work @ Google Sydney
April 3-11, 2016: New Caledonia & Vanuatu | cruise
April 12-18: Australia | Cairns/Great Barrier Reef
April 18 - May 27: Indonesia | Yoga retreat, Java travel with friend Daniel
May 28 - June 23, 2016: New Zealand | south island road trip with my sister, Kelly
June 23 - July 23: French Polynesia | Live aboard Kaimana
July 24 - September 26: USA | My sister's wedding & Burning Man
September 27 - November 6, 2016: Japan | Food tour, Zen Buddhism Meditation Retreat
November 7-30, 2016: Nepal | Trekking, Volunteer with Chhahari Nepal & homestay
November 30-December 29: India | 200-hour yoga teacher training at World Peace Yoga School
January-February 2017: Southeast Asia | Housesitting in Thailand, Trips to Malaysia and Myanmar
March 2017: Hawaii | my best friend's wedding
Bhutan | Help me pay for my research trip to Bhutan! Paypal or Venmo manser.k@gmail.com
UPDATE OCTOBER 2016: It turns out all tourism in Bhutan is controlled through the government, and they charge a flat fee of $200/day to visit, which is double my travel budget. As a result, if you'd like to support my research mission, I would be incredibly grateful if you donated to help me pay for this trip. Help me pay for my research trip to Bhutan! Paypal or Venmo manser.k@gmail.com.
You might have read the BBC News article, Bhutan's Dark Secret to Happiness, in which the author discusses the Bhutanese custom to think about death five times a day. The article was of course fascinating, but for me, also gratifying: to learn that an entire culture uses death as a tool to appreciate life was another notch in my theory-proving belt.
So I guess I'm going to Bhutan.
Look, my main goal isn't to get people to think about death. My mission is to empower people to take control of their life, shed fear and inhibitions, gain clarity on what is important to themselves, and develop an incredible zest for life. Whether that happens through the awareness of life's fragility or through some other means, I don't care. But I do believe that having a healthy awareness of one's mortality is a valuable tool to find that clarity and appreciate life.
Back to the Bhutanese. I'm still researching about their 'think about death five times a day' custom - where it came from, what it's rooted in, what they get from it - but my understanding is that awareness of death is deeply rooted in their culture. I can get down on some solid research in the library - which I will - but why not just go there? This guy in the article confessed to a Bhutanese man while he was there about the panic attacks he'd been suffering. His advice was simple:
“You need to think about death for five minutes every day,” Ura replied. “It will cure you. It is this thing, this fear of death, this fear of dying before we have accomplished what we want or seen our children grow. This is what is troubling you.”
Fear is paralyzing. Yeah, yeah: flight or fight, I know. But in my experience, fear and uncertainty give me decision paralysis. I don't know what to do, so I do nothing, and let my life happen to me. Well, death is certain. We all have that in common. So I believe that if some of the fear around death is alleviated, we're more likely to take control of our lives and appreciate being in it.
This custom of thinking of death isn't the only reason I'm going to Bhutan. This is also a country that came to the table at the UN General Assembly with a proposal to add GNH - General National Happiness - as an country's measurement, in addition to GDP. And it passed. In July 2011, the UN General Assembly passed, without dissent, a Bhutanese-initiated resolution recognizing the pursuit of happiness as a fundamental human goal and noting that this goal is not reflected in GDP.
Bhutan has a Gross National Happiness Commission, chaired by the prime minister, which screens all new policy proposals put forward by government ministries. If a policy is found to be contrary to the goal of promoting gross national happiness, it is sent back to the ministry for reconsideration. Without the Commission's approval, it cannot go ahead (Singer, ABC News).
The country that thinks about death five times a day is also on a crusade to measure and improve happiness around the world. Unexpected? Not for me. But I'm going to find out more. See you soon, Bhutan.
I arrived to Sydney on a cloud of optimism. I chatted with my taxi driver, telling him excitedly that this was my first experience driving on the left side of the road. He listened with as much excitement as a photographer being asked to do some free work “for your portfolio.” I arrived to my Airbnb and chose to ignore the fact that the room was not the one depicted in the glossy photos. In any case, it still had a lovely view overlooking the private, flower-filled courtyard. I texted photos of said lovely courtyard to everyone in my contact list with the caption ‘The view from my room!’ I might have more accurately captioned, “I am fabulous!”
View from the window of my Airbnb room. I'm walking on sunshine! For now.
After a quick shower, I set off to explore the neighborhood. I marveled at all the tanned, blonde and absurdly good looking Australians I walked among. They were so…smooth. I was for some reason surprised by how well-dressed these Sydneysiders are. Like J. Crew, but better. The fabrics are light and the hems are of short enough length to show off tanned limbs, yet remain tasteful and chic. The first glimmer of discomfiture flashed in my chest. My fabrics weren’t right, I was mid-winter pale, and the weeks of goodbye toasts and dinners in Austin had caught up to my thighs. I tried to wave off the feeling.
I wrapped up my first day in paradise with a yin yoga class mostly to keep myself awake until my self-imposed anti-jetlag bedtime of 9pm. More lithe Australians poured into the yoga studio around me, men and women alike. My head was buzzing with exhaustion at this point, having only been asleep for a few jaunty hours in an Economy Plus seat 30,000 feet up. I’m certain I dozed off during the class at one point. I woke up a crumple of American body who was probably moments ago lightly snoring among the Aussie yoga gods stretching and flexing. I stumbled home afterward and fell immediately asleep.
Around 5am, I became conscious to a high-pitched buzzing in both of my ears. I swatted and dozed off. Minutes later, more buzzing, and then more…I alternately dozed and swatted until the sun came up. Good morning! I remembered, I’m in Australia! I stretched out lazily and began to notice red marks all over my legs. A rash? Chicken pox? I remembered the constant buzzing the previous night: mosquito bites. At least thirty just on my legs. In the mirror I marveled in horror: I was covered in bites. My arms, legs, back...even my ass. As if I hadn’t felt enough like a leper already.
At work, I worked on both US and Brazil time zones, which meant 6am meetings with California and 11pm meetings with Brazil. In between, I played hour-plus long games of Lord of the Rings and Batman pinball at the office, and found cubbies to nap in (thank you, Google). The women at the office were more of the well-tanned, well-tailored and toned Aussies I was now annoyed to see. I realized I’ve enjoyed being a blonde who stands out. Here in Australia, I’m a slightly fatter, much paler blonde with clothes that don’t fit in and what probably looks like a highly concerning contagious skin disease. I felt like I did when I started sixth grade in a new school in Iowa: grossly out of place, and wanting desperately to fit in. I was mad I didn’t fit in and madder I even cared about it.
Tigrona was the best! Until he shunned me when I needed him most. Ah, cats.
Two weeks in, I realized that the first leg of my Soul Vacation world tour so far was a bit…sucky. Work is work, even when you lunch overlooking Sydney Harbor. I hadn’t seen much of the city due to long days at work. I spent more than a couple sad evenings trapped in my hot, AC-less bedroom eating packaged snack food and hoping my hosts didn’t think think I was as much of a loser as I felt. My only Australian friend so far was a stray cat who, in true cat form, ran away from me when I tried to greet him the day after he’d laid out with me on my bed. I was lonely.
When friends and family inquired about my (nonexistent) social life here, I lied and told them I was using this time to recharge after a crazy busy last few weeks in Austin saying goodbye and moving. I wasn’t alone for a lack of friends, gosh, I was choosing to be alone.
The weird thing is, I started to believe that white lie, and that attitude shift changed everything. Maybe being alone was exactly what I needed. After those two weeks of feeling foul, I actually did begin to recharge. I took advantage of my Classpass subscription and tried everything from HIIT training to aerial yoga. I owned my solo dinners and ate alone right on the front patio of restaurants like a badass. I set up a few coffees with Googlers.
A few days later, I met my first friend. Then I went on my first Tinder date ever with a nice guy I spent an hour researching before our date. He took me on his motorcycle and as the wind whipped my hair and I held on, I finally felt like I thought I’d feel as a woman traveling the world. Free. And awesome.
A few weeks ago I read something online that said, “Be patient with yourself. Nothing in nature blooms all year.” Dude, I gotta give myself a break. Beating myself up for, essentially, not being Australian? And for not having a social calendar immediately upon arrival in a country I knew literally no one? I think I just learned my Travel Lesson #1: Be patient. And cat friends are more than okay.
I’m on a transpacific jet hurtling from reality to dream. In just a few months I’ve dismantled a perfectly lovely life in favor of a feeling that there is something better for me. Something I’ve got to do.
My bright and cheery apartment pre-move out.
I’ve now closed the door to my downtown Austin apartment, toasted goodbye to my Austin friends, and hugged my family and puppy for the last time for awhile. On one of my final days in town, I walked through the now-vacant apartment that used to be mine and thought about where I started when I rented it. The apartment is all white - floors, walls, ceiling - exactly how I felt when I rented it: a blank page ready for a new story. My story over the past year and a half has been exciting, and unexpected, and pivotal. I found myself with a broken heart at one point, I hosted fabulous parties for dear friends, I sewed myself deeper into the fabric of Austin through volunteer work and leadership, I lost a role model to tragedy, and I was exposed to the idea of living life differently. If you’re looking for a recipe for Big Change, that one proved effective for me.
Over this past year, I contemplated my fragile existence a lot. You could die tomorrow, I thought. I surveyed my life and imagined how I’d feel at the end, looking back. I wanted more. I want to live. I want to die free from regret.
For me, embarking on this Big Trip and sharing my perspective via this blog fulfils that right now. So I made a plan of action, and followed it step by step: Arrange finances (AKA don't buy shit). Move out of apartment. Sell car. Book a one-way ticket.
As I closed the door on that empty white apartment, I was struck with this odd feeling that, cognitively, I know I have taken all these steps to make this dream happen…but in practice it feels so fucking surreal. I suppose I shouldn’t be surprised that when you are living your dream it feels like, well, a dream. Right? So now the sun is rising over both Australia and my new reality. In a couple of hours I'll touch down into this dreamland and feel it firmly beneath my feet. It’s very, very real, and I am ecstatic.
Here's one for the annals of counterintuitive findings: When asked to contemplate the occasion of their own demise, people become happier than usual, instead of sadder, according to a new study in the November issue of Psychological Science.
Read MoreHey, let me tell you a secret: You are in control of your life. You call your own shots. Quick - answer this - what’s important to you?
Read MoreI’m 30, and some fine lines appeared on my face this year. It was my first full year as an unmarried woman since I was twenty years old.
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One day, I cleaned up the kitchen a bit before rushing into work for a regular day. For some reason, I decided to come home an hour early. As I stepped onto my porch, I peered through the glass door and smiled at my dog, Pajamas, sleeping on the couch. I swung open the door, so happy to see her - and was immediately enveloped in the putrid smell of natural gas. Pajamas raised her little head (okay, she’s a pittie, so it’s kind of a big head) from the couch and gazed at me as if in a stupor. I ran over, heart pounding, and grabbed her by her pink collar and dragged her outside into the fresh air. I began frantically waving my hands in front of her snout between hugs and apologies for almost murdering her. Oxygen! Oxygen! It probably looked a bit like I was prostrate and bowing repeatedly to her, Queen Pajamas of Austin. Part “I’m so sorry!” and part “I’m really not worthy/capable to care for an animal!” Once I felt fairly certain she wasn’t dead or about to die, I went inside to open windows, turn on fans and figure out what the hell happened. Ah - I had tweaked the knob on the stove so that for more than seven hours, natural gas was pouring out of the stove with no flame. I had locked my dog in a veritable gas chamber all day long.
That night, after the gas had dissipated into the evening air and I tried to win back my dog’s affections with steak and tennis balls, I thought about what might have happened had I not decided to come home early. I allowed myself to feel how I might feel if Pajamas had died. The guilt was there, of course, but it was mostly sadness and yearning for my best friend. My attempted murder of Pajamas reinforced, for me, how much I love her and appreciate her. Death has a way of doing this, showing us our true feelings. It also has a way of reminding us what’s important in our lives. So sometimes, like last week when I left work to go shopping, halfway down the road I took a screeching right and skipped the mall to take Pajamas to the dog park instead. Because if she was going to die tomorrow, I’d want her last day to be a steak and tennis balls kind of day.
"Today I choose life. Every morning when I wake up I can choose joy, happiness, negativity, pain...To feel the freedom that comes from being able to continue to make mistakes and choices - today I choose to feel life, not to deny my humanity but embrace it."
-Kevyn Aucoin
"Today I choose life. Every morning when I wake up I can choose joy, happiness, negativity, pain...To feel the freedom that comes from being able to continue to make mistakes and choices - today I choose to feel life, not to deny my humanity but embrace it."
-Kevyn Aucoin
I still have bad days that end with me wallowing in my underwear on the couch guzzling a $20 Montepulciano and shoveling mashed taters into my mouth.
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“The greatest obstacle to living is expectancy, which hangs upon tomorrow and loses today. You are arranging what lies in Fortune’s control, and abandoning what lies in yours. What are you looking at? To what goal are you straining? The whole future lies in uncertainty: live immediately.”
― Seneca, On the Shortness of Life
6/4/2015
I’m just so fucking happy to be alive.
I’m happy for it all. I’m happy to hear the sounds of the traffic outside my window. I’m happy to eat the dinner I made myself. I’m happy to have beautiful people in my life. I’m happy to send them cards and maybe brighten their day just a little bit. I’m happy to hug my dog and feel her incredible energy. I’m happy to meet new people in ordinary places. I’m happy to fall in love with half of the people I meet. I’m happy to work in a job in which people are passionate about what they do. I’m happy to feel the energy of people I know and meet. I’m happy to have a little bit of struggle. I’m happy to have endured some struggle so far, and everyday, and still feel grateful to feel things and happy to be in this life.
I made a decision recently to quit my job and leave everything that I know. I made this decision knowing people would think I’m crazy and tell me it’s a bad idea. But I’m grateful to be powerful enough in my own life to say “Fuck all y’all, I don’t care. I know this is what’s best for me.”
I am so happy today because I experienced a difficult time in my life. I didn’t survive cancer, and I wasn’t destitute or hungry. My life wasn’t in danger. But even the small, insignificant period of sadness and hopelessness in my life was enough to provide perspective. In order to feel this incredible feeling of happiness and gratitude, all I had to go through was losing several friends and loved ones and the depression of losing a marriage to a person I loved. That’s it. It felt really hard. I felt depressed, I gained weight, and retreated within myself to a place of pain.
But today, to feel how I feel today...it was nothing. The pain was worth it. I feel so strong, so capable, so ready to take on the world.
In some ways I feel bad. I feel that I’m a person of strength, of confidence, of common sense. If anyone could survive tragic death and divorce, I could. But even so, as a result of that pain and sadness, the power I feel today made it all worth it. Could I have seen that in the moment of hopelessness? No. I didn’t feel it, and I certainly didn’t know it was around the corner.
But life goes on. If one possesses the strength to persevere, there is an incredible gift on the other side.
I do understand that this happiness that I feel now is transient. I may not always feel this happy, this powerful, this connected. But I do feel that I appreciate it. I appreciate it in a way that I never could had I not experienced the pain.
From Steve Jobs' 2005 Stanford commencement address:
"When I was 17, I read a quote that went something like: "If you live each day as if it was your last, someday you'll most certainly be right." It made an impression on me, and since then, for the past 33 years, I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: "If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?" And whenever the answer has been "No" for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.
Remembering that I'll be dead soon is the most important tool I've ever encountered to help me make the big choices in life. Because almost everything — all external expectations, all pride, all fear of embarrassment or failure — these things just fall away in the face of death, leaving only what is truly important. Remembering that you are going to die is the best way I know to avoid the trap of thinking you have something to lose. You are already naked. There is no reason not to follow your heart.
About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. My doctor advised me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die. It means to try to tell your kids everything you thought you'd have the next 10 years to tell them in just a few months. It means to make sure everything is buttoned up so that it will be as easy as possible for your family. It means to say your goodbyes.
I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy, where they stuck an endoscope down my throat, through my stomach and into my intestines, put a needle into my pancreas and got a few cells from the tumor. I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.
This was the closest I've been to facing death, and I hope it's the closest I get for a few more decades. Having lived through it, I can now say this to you with a bit more certainty than when death was a useful but purely intellectual concept:
No one wants to die. Even people who want to go to heaven don't want to die to get there. And yet death is the destination we all share. No one has ever escaped it. And that is as it should be, because Death is very likely the single best invention of Life. It is Life's change agent. It clears out the old to make way for the new. Right now the new is you, but someday not too long from now, you will gradually become the old and be cleared away. Sorry to be so dramatic, but it is quite true.
Your time is limited, so don't waste it living someone else's life. Don't be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people's thinking. Don't let the noise of others' opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary."
"Be soft. Do not let the world make you hard. Do not let the pain make you hate. Do not let the bitterness steal your sweetness. Take pride that even though the rest of the world may disagree, you still believe it to be a beautiful place." -Iain Thomas
Maybe I just really love Whole Foods, but for the past year I've had this nagging feeling that love IS everything.
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