As I was getting ready to leave our airbnb this morning, I noticed that I was really enjoying packing up. It gave me a little thrill to carefully put each little piece of gear in its appointed place. The last few days I’ve been living high on the hog, sleeping on the same room I woke up in, so my stuff was just strewn all over. Something about having to put it all in a tiny pack that barely holds its contents brought me a deep sense of satisfaction, and it got me thinking philosophically about scarcity - that is, not having enough of stuff, be it space, money, time, etc. When you’re a kid, you just assume that more is better. A bigger box of crayons with more colors in it must be better than a smaller box. A bigger toy is better than a smaller toy. Some people never really get past that stage. And, to be fair, there’s nothing fun about being broke, or hungry, or sick. But, it’s a well-known artistic principle that limiting the canvas really helps with the process. Since the dawn of time, artists have artificially constrained themselves, using small canvases, or outdated techniques, or limiting their color palette. There’s something about abundance that can be a little bit shocking and deadening, introducing a sense of dullness. Our competitive instinct is what keeps us moving; at a deep level, I’m convinced that we’re still waking up every morning worried about filling our bellies and avoiding lions. When our minds sense that we have enough of everything, they shut down the intelligence - after all, thinking and struggling consume resources, and when we don’t need to, why would we?
Anyway, to come down off the philosophy for a moment, there’s something about the purity of this trip that really is focusing my mind. Getting on the bike, living out of a tiny bag, sharpens the senses. When you only have to make a limited number of decisions, you savor those decisions. When you only have 3 shirts, you know how you’re going to get dressed that day. Losing the myriad of - let’s face it - meaningless choices imposed on us by modern city life makes the more important ones bubble to the surface. I can’t get wait to get back on the road.
On a related note, I wrote a few days ago about getting stronger physically, but I noticed today that I’m definitely getting stronger mentally as well. I’m not sure if it’s so much that I have a clearer sense of who I am, as much as I just feel more comfortable expressing that, and being in my own skin. I’ve long understood that, when it comes to the big choices, I have to be my own man, but I think I was still struggling with the little things - with the thousands of tiny choices we make around other humans every day. I’ve written before in a different blog about feeling a bit like a giant in a land of tiny people; that sense of paralysis that comes from feeling like every little move you make - and I”m speaking metaphorically here - every emotional move you make is going to potentially hurt someone. I’ve always lacked confidence in my social skills, and I worry a lot about every little conversation, even with people I don’t know (in fact *especially* with people I don’t know). But lately, I just kind of don’t give as much of a shit, and I think that - for me - that’s healthy. The weird thing is that it seems like the more I care, the more I twist in anxiety, and the more I come across as stilted and weird. It’s a negative feedback loop. By genuinely expecting everyone else to be the protagonist of their own story, and letting them react to me however they like, I can calm down. I just don’t have the energy to manage other peoples’ emotional states, and the sooner I realize that, the better.
As a reward to those who read that far, here's the unedited first 10 days of my GoPro footage. Warning: it's truly unedited, and almost unwatchable, but yet it's still strangely fascinating in parts. Eventually I'll be turning it into a full multimedia project.