A friend has spent the last week in Los Angeles and got me stoked to get out on the road again.

It is now less than a month from my next excursion and my first time visiting the Northwest.  One better, a different friend is taking the entire time off and heading out with me.  It will be an entire week to witness what another part of the country has to offer.  I’ve heard plenty of great things about the area but now I’ll be able to see first hand.

Fall will be starting the week we go so the weather should be fantastic.

This won’t be some crazy trip to around the world but it is one of only a few I was able to take this year.  Since I tackled all my debt, next year will involve more travel.  I won’t have any literal or figurative baggage this time, so it will be done the right way.

More to follow soon enough!

It isn’t quite what I was looking for in the way of a road trip but I did spend most of my day on the road today.  It was for the business so it is all worth the effort.  After evaluating where I am and where I want to be within 5 years, I decided a few months ago to really take ownership with the business.  It has been a great opportunity to grow and to help provide a living for our crew and us as well.

Fortunately for me, I am surrounded by skilled people, and am related to a couple of them.  Being in business with family is challenging at times, but is, I think, ultimately rewarding.

I often find myself at odds with the thinking of my immediate family and have found the only remedy is to distance myself from it.  This doesn’t affect my ability to do what I need to do as a leader, but it is certainly discouraging.  There is no other word to describe this mentality besides pervasive.  It is always there on the surface, and goes deep.  I don’t feel the same way at all.  I see possibility, I see the growth potential, I see monumental successes.  All I can do is reiterate those sort of things to myself and live the way I need to.

This deviates a good deal from the original focus of my blog, but this is where I am at these days.  Life is a journey, sometimes it is literal, but right now mostly the figurative portions.

After taking the first half of 2018 to grind away all my debt, I finally have the peace of mind and freedom I need to get back to writing.  It has been a while since I was able to maintain some consistency with my posts because I was infatuated with freeing myself from my self-administered shackles.

One evening last week I noticed it was particularly beautiful out so I decided to go for a drive.  As I pulled out of the driveway it really hit me:  I am driving a car that I have paid for twice and is now officially mine alone.  I started laughing and smiled.  It is absolutely surreal.  Life has always been pretty good, but now it is getting great.

I drove around the town I live in and have for my whole life and saw things in a completely different light, with a sort of confidence that was completely foreign to me because I had never felt it before.  Everything I saw made me light up with possibility.  I looked at the nicer homes and thought to myself that I don’t have to compromise, that I can have the exact home I want.  My little bit of zen in an uncertain world.

It has also occurred to me that now I can be completely unhindered in my quest to visit more of the world.  All I need to do is make a plan for a destination, set the budget for the trip, save aggressively toward the goal, and take the leap.  The best part is, I won’t have to feel like I ruined 6 months of my life because I bankrolled the whole thing with debt.  It will just be a straight forward victory in every regard.

Happiness has been admittedly elusive in my first 35 years, but 36+ feels substantially different.  I am at ease with my place in the world, and I only see things improving from here on out.  This is my life, and I will no longer be a spectator.