Bren on The Road

Category: Musings

Why Everyone Should Work A 9-5 Before Travelling

Yep, that’s it. See that photo up there? ^

That’s my old cubicle. I didn’t like it very much.

You probably already know that; I trash having a 9-5 pretty regularly on this blog.

Well today, things will be a little different. I’m going to soften my 9-5 hating, and here’s why.

Often I get emails from people, looking for 9 to 5 job alternatives to fund their travels, torn between the decision to travel or work while they’re young, or maybe just wanting to know how to avoid the 9-5 life altogether.

Just the other day I got yet another email from a reader who had just finished university. He had been working an internship the year before and the resulting misery had him conclude there was no way he would start a 9-5 career after he graduated (I get a lot of emails like this).

Yet, he didn’t have other plans. He knew he wanted to travel, and knew he didn’t want a job. But it seemed he didn’t have a clear idea of what he actually wanted to strive for. Travel seemed to be a way of running away from something (a job), rather than running towards another dream or goal that he wanted to pursue.

I can’t blame him. A lot of my travels were due to the same thing. But I can say with certainty it was the times when I wasn’t ‘just travelling’, but rather pursuing something I was passionate about (learning Chinese in China, learning Spanish in Spain, learning to fight in The Philippines, dancing in Ecuador, surfing in NZ) that have been the most enjoying and fulfilling.

If you don’t want to get a job, what are you going to do instead? What are your plans? What do you want to dedicate your life to?

Without a clear answer, you will probably just end up drifting on the road for longer than you should, which can be a lot more damaging than sitting in a cubicle hating your life.

People often look at a 9-5 as a life-long thing. Start at age 25, work until age 50, retire, then sit around and play golf and stuff.

I prefer to think of a 9-5 a different way. I think of it as a stepping stone, something that can be used to move onto something better. Jobs are often seen as employers getting employees to do crappy things, but with the right motivation you can get a lot more out of your 9-5 if you focus on the ways it can benefit you. Put yourself first and your boss second. For example:

Do not get a 9-5 to simply earn and spend money on a consumerist lifestyle.

Instead, use it to live as frugally as possible and enjoy the regularity of a paycheck to build a war-fund of savings. My travels have only been possible due to the money I saved during my time in corporate. I still have some of that money, so in a way, three years after I quit my job my old boss is still paying for my travels around the world.

Do not get a 9-5 to learn how to do a job.

Instead, use it to network, develop social skills, and build some discipline into your life.

The job itself is unimportant.

You are not there to earn money for your boss. You are there to grow and develop new skills. The real value of my years in corporate was not learning to use Excel, but rather the skills I learned with things like networking, dealing with conflicts and time management. I also made many great friends/contacts with whom I still stay in touch with to this day.

If you have the choice between sitting at your desk on Friday to get in your boss’s goodie books or going for a drink to network, go and network! You’re going to quit in a few years anyway.

Do not get a 9-5 job with the intent of building a career of multiple decades.

Set yourself a limit of maybe 2-5 years, and work hard to maximise your time there; constantly negotiate salary increases, save aggressively, and don’t be afraid to leave for a bigger payday.

Put maximum effort into optimising skills that will be useful in your future endeavours (negotiating, selling, research) and do the bare minimum on ‘office monkey’ skills that only provide value to your boss (data entry, outdated softwares, running reports).

Give your time to the employer that treats you best (pays you the most) and make sure you spend time developing the skills that benefit you.

Do not let a 9-5 job be the main focus of your life.

It may take up most of your time, but remember it is only a means to an end.

Use these years of security to figure out what you really want to do. Constantly seek out other endeavours and consider the options you can pursue once you leave. Where are you going to travel to? Why? What do you hope to achieve? Quite often, you might actually find the thought of eventually chasing these ambitions are the only thing that gets you through the day.

Instead of enduring a 9-5 and hating your life, look at your time there as a way to set yourself up for something better. Build yourself a solid financial foundation. Decide what it is you really want to do. Concentrate on developing the skills that have life value and give only the minimum to tasks that don’t.

In a few years when you’re finally ready, you can write your resignation letter, fire your boss, and move onto your travels (or whatever else you desire) with passion and purpose.

It doesn’t end there.

You will find that long after you leave, your time in corporate will have a huge effect on your travels. You will see things and travel differently to those who never went through the same experience. You will share an instant bond with other corporate runaways.

Just the other day at my hostel here in Ecuador, I met an Aussie guy who told me he saved up three years for his round the world trip. In his exact words, “It was like a prison sentence”.

We both laughed at this, because we understood each other completely. We both knew how it felt to wait longingly for that moment to break free. We both knew the joy of handing in that four weeks notice. To us, the freedom of being on the road was just that little bit sweeter.

Very often I meet young people travelling around the world, usually not much older than 18 or 19. Some are in the middle of university, and some didn’t even begin at all. But they are there, sitting on the bus next to me, journeying down the Tanzanian coast or the Cambodian countryside. I always love meeting these people, because they are young and generally share my same carefree outlook on life, but I don’t click with them in the same way as I do with a fellow cubicle refugee.

They didn’t grind through the same years of corporate chains.

They didn’t go through the misery of early morning commutes in winter.

They didn’t go through the years of breathing stale office air, rushing through one-hour lunch breaks and enduring Monday afternoons hunched over a cubicle.

They didn’t experience trying to squeeze an entire year of wants into 4 pitiful weeks of annual leave.

They didn’t enjoy the thrill of roughing up your voice and pretending to call in sick.

They don’t know what it’s like to wake up in the morning, put on clothes you don’t want to wear, and sit in a desk that makes you miserable for 8 long hours, every…single…day.

Interestingly, this is probably a big factor in the key differences you’ll notice between those who worked before travelling and those who didn’t. Those who travelled straight after graduation are almost always planning to either return home and ‘get a job’, or end up drifting aimlessly on the road for too many years.

But those who escaped a 9-5 always have bigger plans. They end up starting hostels, restaurants, tour companies, online businesses, freelance careers, blogs, or other entrepreneurial ventures that gel with their skillset. They find ways to build travel into their life and their career. And while part of this is probably due in part to business skills learned in their corporate life, I suspect most of it is due to a vicious motivation to maintain their freedom and avoid a return to the 9-5 at all costs.

It’s because we’ve been in the cubicle. We know what it’s like.

That’s why we make sure we never have to go back.

When I look back at the moment I finished my last university exam, it was a strange time in my life. I was so relieved that it was over, but it was also filled with uncertainty. I already had a signed job contract for the following year, but I had no idea what I actually wanted from life. Accounting career? Entrepreneur? Marriage? It was all a big unknown.

In that sense, a 9-5 was probably the best thing that could’ve happened to me. It gave me time to think and plan, to experience the corporate world, and build a strong foundation financially. It also allowed me to determine a clearer picture of what I did and didn’t want from life. It wasn’t enjoyable, but it was beneficial in many ways and definitely set me off in the right direction.

So to all those in that state of post graduation limbo wondering what on earth to do with their life, whether to travel or work, how to cure the wanderlust they keep feeling every day, is this:

Get a job.

Use the time to save and plan. Get everything you can out of it. Use it as a tool to help you grow and develop. Don’t work for your boss; work for you. You’re going to be miserable and you’re going to curse every morning when you alarm clock goes off, but when it’s finally time to leave, the freedom and joy of travelling the world will be sweeter than ever.

Did you leave a 9-5 to travel the world? How did it change your journey and perspective? What would you recommend? Let me know in the comments below.

October 6, 2014
The Dark Side Of Travelling

It’s an exciting life, being a traveller. Every day you witness new things, you meet interesting people, you discover new ways of living and you eat food you never knew existed. You find yourself inspired by things you never thought you’d care about, and a new version of you is moulded with every new experience. If there’s one way to rediscover the magic in life, it’s travelling.

But there’s a dark side to travelling, too. A lot of the time, you are alone. You have no friends, you have no family. You may be sitting in an empty hotel room in a faraway town, or eating breakfast alone in a small, crowded teahouse. Sometimes, you just lie in bed and stare at the ceiling, starving painfully, but lacking the energy to wander the streets for a decent place to eat. It’s times like these when you long for company. The sound of a familiar voice. The comfort of a familiar face.

And then when you finally meet someone, it’s never long before you have to part ways. Sometimes, it’s just the guy in the bunk above you. Maybe you ate lunch together, or shared a few beers. A few days later you shake hands and say you’ll keep in touch, but of course, you never do. Other times, you meet a new best friend. It’s like you’ve found a long lost brother from Spain or Sweden. Those friendships always brew crazy memories, as if you’ve been friends since childhood. But it only lasts a week. Eventually, it’s time for them to pack up and move on too. Slowly, it weathers you. One can only handle so many goodbyes.

Then when you least expect it, you’ll fall in love. You won’t even know what hit you. But the road is not kind to love. Those goodbyes are the painful ones. They eat away at you. They’re the ones you’ll still think about, many years from now.

Somewhere along the way, you’ll need to come home. That is hard to describe. At first it’s as if nothing has changed. That old coffee shop with chipped red and white paint is still standing on the corner, and your old friends still slam tequilas at the bar every Friday night. But soon you realise, your old life has passed you by. People are married, they have children, they have houses and a DVD collection. They’ve built a life for themselves, and you weren’t there to be a part of it. Home has changed, but more subtly and slowly than you expected. Suddenly, it’s like you’re a stranger in your own town.

With this realisation, it doesn’t take long for the fragile comfort of home to wear off. Sometimes it’s just a couple of days. You find yourself itching to explore again. Maybe you’ll go to Togo this time. Or Venezuela.

Why?

No idea. Just because.

Wanderlust is like a drug. It consumes you. Once the road has a hold of you it never lets you go. You are drawn to it, you crave it. It’s an addiction. The conventional life becomes nothing but an afterthought. You might have worked hard for it once, but you threw it away, and maybe you’ll regret that one day. Or, maybe you won’t. But you didn’t really have a choice anyway. A roving foot is too hard to stop.

“Once you have tasted flight, you will forever walk the earth with your eyes turned skyward, for there you have been, and there you will always long to return.” – Leonardo da Vinci

August 28, 2014
Why Every Person Needs To Travel The World

After talking to some of my friends back home I’ve realised how much my view of the world has changed since I left New Zealand 3 years ago. As I continue to experience different cultures the way I see the world continues to evolve, for better or worse, and each encounter seems to add different perspectives that my previous self would have never even tried to appreciate. But, what’s most interesting is that when I look back, it’s the moments that were seemingly insignificant at the time that have ended up influencing me the most. There’s been many, but here’s 3 of my favourites.

The self proclaimed ‘parking warden’ in Colombia

While travelling through the small Colombian city of Pereira, I got in touch with a Couchsurfing contact named Carlos to help show me around town. After we agreed to meet he picked me up in his flash 4WD and we headed off to a small cafe for a drink and something to eat. He was cool, and we chatted like old friends as we drove out to the city. Then, something weird happened. As we arrived and he started parking the car, an old, raggedy looking man got up off the curb and stood in front of us. I thought he was going to cause trouble, but I quickly learned he was just trying to help us park the car. Slightly puzzled, I watched as he slowly walked back, holding his arms out and guiding us in, giving us the ‘slowly, slowly’ signal and then finally telling us to stop. All I could think in my head was “gee thanks, old man, for helping us park a car in a completely empty parking lot.”

I didn’t give him too much thought after that, but when it came time to leave we walked out to the car and he was still sitting there. He stood up, went to the back of the car and started ushering us out, again not really doing anything helpful, but trying to look like he was. Once we’d backed out and were ready to drive off, Carlos wound down the window, gave him a few coins and said “Gracias”, before heading off down the road.

“Why did you pay him?” I asked.

“Oh, that’s his spot. They all have their own spots. If you park there, they make sure no one touches your car and you just give them some money to say thanks.”

“But is anyone going to touch your car anyway?”

“No, probably not.”

“So what happens if you don’t pay him?”

“Nothing.”

I remember looking at him like he was an idiot. It all seemed so bizarre to me.

“Well why do you need to pay him when you don’t even want his help?” I asked.

He smiled.

“We are like that in Colombia. It’s our culture, we just try to help each other. He needs to get money somewhere, so we give it to him. Otherwise he’ll be annoying people, stealing from them, it’s not good. We all give him a few pesos, and it’s not a problem.”

After thinking about it for most of the day, I actually started to admire that old man. He was trying to make a way to earn money for himself, without hurting anybody or bothering anyone; just giving himself the dignity of “working”, albeit nothing important, and in a weird kind of way, making an honest living. But more than that, Carlos’ attitude was one that I had never seen in my own country. It was as if giving was so normal for him, that he didn’t even think twice about it. When did the culture in my own country become so selfish? Carlos doesn’t know it, but I learned an incredible lesson from him that day, and my opinion of Colombia and it’s people changed completely. I really think the world would be a much better place if we all started being a little more Colombian.

“Blessed are those who can give without remembering and take without forgetting.” -Elizabeth Bibesco

The fried rice lady in Shanghai

While I was living in Shanghai I would get dinner from a bunch of street food stalls outside my dorms. I had a few favourites, but there was this one lady who sold fried rice that I’d buy from nearly every night. Eventually she started to recognise me, and in her head she’d probably labelled me as the guy who always wanted 2 eggs and no chili.

One Friday, after a hard night out, I’d fallen asleep in the back of the taxi. As we pulled up to my dorms I paid the driver, stumbled out of the car and started walking towards the gate. It was almost 4 a.m. but in the distance, I saw 3 old ladies and their food stands, sitting half-asleep on their stools in the blistering cold. I squinted and in my drunken haze, I noticed my fried rice lady was one of them, leaning against a pillar in her usual spot. As she saw me from afar she laughed, jumped up and turned on her wok. How could I possibly not buy a box of rice from her now?

For those of you who’ve been to Shanghai, you’ll know the winter night there is brutal. It’s a sharp, piercing cold, usually sub zero, and when you add in the air pollution it’s just insanely uncomfortable. But here was this old lady, probably pushing 60, sitting out in the cold at 4 a.m. at the slight chance of earning a few extra dollars.

What I vividly remember though, as I stood in front of her, warming my hands against her stove and watching her cook my rice, was looking at her face and thinking to myself “Why have I never worked this hard?”

They say that struggle breeds success, and if I’m honest with myself I’m not sure that I’ve ever really struggled a day in my life. I mean, yeah, I had those sleepless nights during exams, which were unbelievably traumatic, and there were those near-death experiences where I had to work through the day without a lunch break. Gosh, with a life so cruel, how am I even still alive?

All sarcasm aside, what are we meant to work towards when we’ve been handed a fairytale life? What do we do when we’re already born with full stomachs and beds with clean sheets? We be grateful, of course, but does that also mean our work is done? Or does it just mean we’re expected to do so much more? I’m starting to believe it’s the latter.

“Never throughout history has a man who lived a life of ease lived a life worth remembering.” -Theodore Roosevelt

The Tanzanian Jimmy Carter

I’ve been to Tanzania a few times now, and in the small town of Moshi I’ve gotten to know various locals over the years. One of them is a street seller who introduces himself as Jimmy Carter (yes, like the old American president). Why? I have absolutely no idea.

The first time I met him he ran up to me on the street and tried selling me bracelets. He was relentless. He followed me all around town, even when I ignored him for about 15 minutes, and no matter how many times I said no he just wouldn’t let up.

“2,000 shillings! OK, 1,500. OK 1,000. OK 500! Please brother 500. OK 200.”

I had to admire his persistence. In the end I gave him 500 shillings (about 50 cents) and let him keep his bracelets to annoy someone else with.

Over time I got to know Jimmy well. Whenever he saw me he’d chase me down, and while he initially would try to sell me stuff, we eventually just became friends. I had considered him a nuisance to begin with, but once I started taking the time to actually listen to him his stories began to surprise me. I was actually amazed at how adept and insightful his street selling had made him.

“Find the girl who walks slowly. She’s the one who buys. The one who walks fast, she’s too busy, she won’t buy.”

“The paintings, I always see girls buy paintings from the store. So now I carry small paintings, and the girls buy it. I never carry the big ones though, no one buys the big ones. Maybe its hard to carry.”

The more time he spent on the street the more his business savvy improved, and through experience he’d learned business lessons that most of us don’t even learn in school.

“I show them this bracelet first, the cheap one. Then I show them the nice one. When they see the cheap one first, they always buy the nice one after.”

“I need to talk to people like you, to practice the English. When I learn more words, I can learn more negotiate. When I learn English my selling really increase.”

“I have to dress nice, you know. When I wear this shirt, people like me more, I sell more. So I always wear this shirt.”

It was fascinating. He was changing up his stock, staying presentable, learning to look for high probability customers and learning how to price things. He even understood the concepts of price fixing and supply and demand, and although he didn’t use those ‘academic’ terms, he understood the concepts perfectly. It was stuff I’d spent entire semesters learning in marketing and economics class, and here was some African kid who’d learned it on the street and at times would make more sense than my university professors. Is it any wonder China’s richest man started out selling candy on the street for less than $1 a day? It was a humbling lesson that we should never underestimate the guys at the bottom, because the truth is they’re probably smarter than us, work harder than we’ve ever worked and will probably end up making more than we’ve ever made. I really hope that one day I’ll return and I’ll meet Jimmy not on the street, but standing in his own store.

“Many who are self-taught far excel the doctors, masters, and bachelors of the most renowned universities.” -Ludwig von Mises

I look back at my former self and it terrifies me. Just the closed-mindedness I had, that anyone who was poor was poor because they were lazy, and that anyone who didn’t go to university didn’t go because they were stupid. I’ve learned that there’s no ‘right path’ in life and everyone will find their own way if you let them. I used to think because I passed some fancy exams and wore a suit that I was better than the guy on the street, when in reality it’s the guy on the street who will probably change the world and I’m the one who’s more likely to flitter away into mediocrity. Travelling has definitely forced me to check my privelege and concede that while my life has been pleasant, it’s mostly been lived in a precious bubble that’s stopped me from seeing what’s really on the outside.

“Travel is fatal to prejudice, bigotry, and narrow-mindedness, and many of our people need it sorely on these accounts. Broad, wholesome, charitable views of men and things cannot be acquired by vegetating in one little corner of the earth all one’s lifetime.”

– Mark Twain

So travel. It’s an education greater than any university degree and one you will never find in any classroom. Quite simply, it will change your life.

Photo credit (modified): Andrea_44@Flickr

April 7, 2014
Why Travelling Alone Will Change You Forever
“Are you going by yourself?”

“Yes.”

“But…how do you do that?”

“I get on the plane. And I go. By myself.”

*confused look*

I’ve had this conversation about 900 times. Do I not have any friends? Am I crazy? Am I getting deported? Why am I going alone?

It’s simple. To me, travel is a personal experience. It’s a chance to learn about yourself; who you are and what you want from life. It allows you to see how different the world is and to put your life in perspective. When you remove yourself from your life back home, you’re able to take that time to reflect and see things in your life a little differently. However, when you take a bit of home with you (i.e. a friend), that becomes a lot harder to do.

And then, when you are alone, there are no limitations. You can go north or south, by boat or by train, you can just sit on the street for the whole day and watch the world go by. There are no rules, no one hour lunch breaks. There’s no one else to worry about and no one checking up on you. You can eat whatever you want and sleep wherever you want. For once, you can finally just ask yourself what you want to do today, and then do it. In the process, you’ll learn things about yourself that will surprise even you.

“The man who goes alone can start today; but he who travels with another must wait until that other is ready.”
–Henry David Thoreau

One very common reason people have for not travelling is “I don’t have anyone to go with.”

That’s not a reason. It doesn’t even make sense. Are airlines only selling double passes now? Is there a buy one get one free sale?

Let’s get real. It’s an excuse, and not a very good one.

I get you, though. I’ll be the first to admit – that first solo trip is pretty tough. You wonder what on earth you’re doing. You’re afraid you’ll have no friends and you’ll be sitting in your hotel room watching TV for two weeks. I know, because I’ve been there. Trust me.

My first solo trip was to Málaga, Spain, four years ago. I went there to take a language course, thinking it would be cool adventure to tell my grandchildren. As soon as I got to my room I just lay on the bed for five hours, staring at the ceiling. I fell asleep. I woke up and stared some more.

“I want to go home,” I thought.

I was terrified to leave my room. I wondered who would be out there, what I would say to them. I wanted to eat dinner but I didn’t want to sit in a restaurant by myself. I’d look stupid. I didn’t even know if there was a restaurant nearby. Maybe I’d walk too far and I’d get lost. Maybe people would look at me funny. I couldn’t even speak Spanish! How would I order my food, or ask for directions? My stomach was growling, but I just couldn’t get myself to get up and go.

In the end, I didn’t eat dinner that night. I stayed in my room, watched TV on my laptop and went back to sleep.

Needless to say, things got better. But the only reason things got better was because I started making them better. And I only started making them better because I had to start making them better. If I sat in my room all day like a typical introvert, no one would’ve cared. No one would’ve even known. There was no best friend there to come knocking on my door, to hang out with all day, to talk to at lunch, to go on trips with. The only person I had to depend on was myself.

I started being more sociable. It was uncomfortable at first, but I did it. I made an effort to talk to people and introduce myself. I got to know all my classmates. I learned to say YES to every invitation, no matter what is was for or where we were going. Slowly, I started to see a different side of me. I loved meeting new people, learning new things. I found a new enthusiasm for life. And in the midst of it, I suddenly realised how constrained and limited my life had been back home.

By the end of five weeks, I felt completely at home in Málaga. I remember sitting in the taxi on the way to the airport, trying to talk to my driver who couldn’t speak a word of English. In my broken Spanish, we talked about his wife and kids, his hobbies, what it was like to grow up on the coast. I was amazed that we actually understood each other.

I stared out the window and thought about all the things I’d learned, how different I felt and how much I’d changed in such a short time. Just five weeks earlier I had been a frightened idiot too scared to leave my room to eat. Now I was chatting in a new language with a complete stranger and had made a whole new network of friends from all around the world. When it came time to board the plane, I was crushed to leave, but I was so thankful for the inspiration. Just one short trip led to so many positive changes in my life, ultimately leading me to the journey that I’m on today.

“We cannot expect to grow if we are too afraid or unwilling to change and face challenges. When we exit our everyday, mundane lifestyles to do something different we can experience growth, undiscovered strength, and new abilities within ourselves.”
-Ashley Ormon

People will ask, do you really need to go alone? Can’t you take someone with you? Won’t it be just as awesome?

Well, yes. I’ve travelled with friends and it was a lot of fun. But when you have someone with you, it’s just not the same. You have to agree on where to eat, where to sleep. You need to discuss what sights to see, how long you’ll stay. In times of uncertainty or loneliness you have someone to depend on and seek comfort in. More often than not, you will learn more about your travel buddy than you will learn about yourself. There will always be compromises, and whenever you compromise you are, by definition, settling for something less than what you truly want.

For that reason, I always encourage people to travel alone at least once in their life. An adventure with no limitations, no excuses and no compromises. It might be the scariest thing you’ve ever done, but if you do it, I can promise you three things:
1. It’ll be one trip you’ll never forget.
2. You’ll return home a completely different person than you were before, and people will notice it.
3. You’ll want to do it again.
Why do you go away? So that you can come back. So that you can see the place you came from with new eyes and extra colors. And the people there see you differently, too. Coming back to where you started is not the same as never leaving.”
-Terry Pratchett

Travelling alone has probably been the most rewarding thing I’ve ever done.

I feel like a completely different person than I was 4 years ago.

I believe in myself now.

I can depend on myself.

I’m not afraid to chase my dreams and try and build the life I want.

If something seems hard or awkward, I’ll do it anyway.

Failure excites me.

I want to learn and grow.

I see everything differently than I used to, and I don’t need alcohol or television or video games to have fun.

When I need to, I am able to simply sit in silence and just enjoy the company of myself. The world has become a completely different place.

Have you travelled alone before? Did you love it? Hate it? What’s your experience? Let me know in the comments below!

Travelling alone and…

Looking for tours and activities at an affordable price? I use GetYourGuide! Always great deals and local perks.
For travel insurance, I always use World Nomads – get protected for just a few dollars a day!
Somewhere to stay? Booking.com gives you the biggest selection and the best rates.
March 8, 2014
Happy Chinese New Year

So, what’s going to be different for you this year? Have you already done your “write down all the New Year’s resolutions that you’ve already forgotten about” and the “lie on your bed and think about all the things you want to do but won’t” thing yet?

Yeah, me too.

Isn’t it weird how we’re all shrouded in self doubt, knowing deep down what we really want to do but for some reason we just…don’t?

Things are getting better for me though, slowly, and I want to tell you why. I quit my job 2 and half years ago, and it’s only now that I’m finally managing to be sure of myself. I’ve finally managed to look society in the eye, throw the rulebook in it’s face and say “Nah. I think I’ll go my own way from here.”

When 2013 started I had it in my head that sometime during the year I would finally need to resume my role as an office dwelling, salary earning, Excel tinkering, career ladder climbing accountant. It’s what was expected of me. It’s what I expected of myself. It’s what I had spent all those years studying for. And everyone’s gotta have a job, right?

But it just didn’t seem…right. I was 24. My whole life was ahead of me. And who knew how long that ‘whole life’ was going to be. A meteor might crash through my window and reduce me to ashes tonight. Did I really want to surrender the time I had left tapping on a keyboard taking orders from some unknown suit, just because…I’m supposed to?

And then I realised, who said that? Who said I’m supposed to?

Nobody. Nobody important, anyway.

Just the collective voices of society, socially conditioned voices telling me that everyone else was doing it so I had to do it too. I remember back at my old office we used to laugh about how much life sucked. Monday mornings in the elevator didn’t even require words. All that was needed was a long, defeated sigh and we would all smile and nod our heads in agreement. We were united by our misery.

We couldn’t even complain about it, because it was accepted as the norm. All of us were miserable. We all had dreams passing us by. What made you so special that you were allowed to complain?

That’s not a club I can be a part of anymore. I was only given one life and it didn’t come with a warranty. Miserable isn’t quite good enough when the stakes are that high. So one day I decided, maybe I just won’t follow the rules. Sue me. I don’t want to wake up and think “Wow, today is going to suck…again”. I want to love life, every day, and the only way to do that is to be free. Free yourself from all the imaginary boundaries imposed on you. Free yourself from the unwritten rules that you thought you had to follow. Once you do that, life suddenly becomes a journey of endless possibilities.

What will you do? Where will you go? 100 years won’t be nearly enough.

I was in a dark spot a couple years ago, completely confused about life and no idea where I was heading. I sought the advice of a mentor of mine, and as we stood out on the road in the middle of the night he looked me in the eye and gave me the best advice I’ve ever had.

“Life is not about being an angel or a saint. Your happiness comes down to one question. You might not know the answer to it yet. And the answer to it will change all the time. But you need to keep asking yourself, what do you want?“

It was so simple, yet I had never truly understood it. After years of being told what to do by everyone around me I’d forgotten about…me.

Why are we taught to spend 48 weeks of our year living someone else’s life in order to earn 4 weeks at the end to finally live our own? Shouldn’t it be the other way around?

So make it that way. Make 2014 a year about you. What do you want? Who do you want to be? What do you want to achieve?

Don’t worry about what everyone else wants. That’s their problem. Being happy is about knowing what you want, believing in yourself and chasing your own dreams. Be a little bit selfish. Nobody has to live your life except you.

Happy Year of the Horse, friends. Make it a f*cking fantastic one.

Photo credit: photophilde@Flickr

January 30, 2014
The One Speech I’ve Never Forgotten

Of all the speeches I’ve heard or read, there’s one that has influenced my life far more than any other. It’s done it’s fair share of rounds through the blogosphere over the years, but even if you’ve already read it I’d suggest taking it in again. For me at least, it never seems to lose it’s power.

The speaker is Adrian Tan, a prominent Singapore lawyer and author.

I must say thank you to the faculty and staff of the Wee Kim Wee School of Communication and Information for inviting me to give your convocation address. It’s a wonderful honour and a privilege for me to speak here for ten minutes without fear of contradiction, defamation or retaliation. I say this as a Singaporean and more so as a husband.

My wife is a wonderful person and perfect in every way except one. She is the editor of a magazine. She corrects people for a living. She has honed her expert skills over a quarter of a century, mostly by practising at home during conversations between her and me.

On the other hand, I am a litigator. Essentially, I spend my day telling people how wrong they are. I make my living being disagreeable.

Nevertheless, there is perfect harmony in our matrimonial home. That is because when an editor and a litigator have an argument, the one who triumphs is always the wife.

And so I want to start by giving one piece of advice to the men: when you’ve already won her heart, you don’t need to win every argument.

Marriage is considered one milestone of life. Some of you may already be married. Some of you may never be married. Some of you will be married. Some of you will enjoy the experience so much, you will be married many, many times. Good for you.

The next big milestone in your life is today: your graduation. The end of education. You’re done learning.

You’ve probably been told the big lie that “Learning is a lifelong process” and that therefore you will continue studying and taking masters’ degrees and doctorates and professorships and so on. You know the sort of people who tell you that? Teachers. Don’t you think there is some measure of conflict of interest? They are in the business of learning, after all. Where would they be without you? They need you to be repeat customers.

The good news is that they’re wrong.

The bad news is that you don’t need further education because your entire life is over. It is gone. That may come as a shock to some of you. You’re in your teens or early twenties. People may tell you that you will live to be 70, 80, 90 years old. That is your life expectancy.

I love that term: life expectancy. We all understand the term to mean the average life span of a group of people. But I’m here to talk about a bigger idea, which is what you expect from your life.

You may be very happy to know that Singapore is currently ranked as the country with the third highest life expectancy. We are behind Andorra and Japan, and tied with San Marino. It seems quite clear why people in those countries, and ours, live so long. We share one thing in common: our football teams are all hopeless. There’s very little danger of any of our citizens having their pulses raised by watching us play in the World Cup. Spectators are more likely to be lulled into a gentle and restful nap.

Singaporeans have a life expectancy of 81.8 years. Singapore men live to an average of 79.21 years, while Singapore women live more than five years longer, probably to take into account the additional time they need to spend in the bathroom.

So here you are, in your twenties, thinking that you’ll have another 40 years to go. Four decades in which to live long and prosper.

Bad news. Read the papers. There are people dropping dead when they’re 50, 40, 30 years old. Or quite possibly just after finishing their convocation. They would be very disappointed that they didn’t meet their life expectancy.

I’m here to tell you this. Forget about your life expectancy.

After all, it’s calculated based on an average. And you never, ever want to expect being average.

Revisit those expectations. You might be looking forward to working, falling in love, marrying, raising a family. You are told that, as graduates, you should expect to find a job paying so much, where your hours are so much, where your responsibilities are so much.

That is what is expected of you. And if you live up to it, it will be an awful waste.

If you expect that, you will be limiting yourself. You will be living your life according to boundaries set by average people. I have nothing against average people. But no one should aspire to be them. And you don’t need years of education by the best minds in Singapore to prepare you to be average.

What you should prepare for is mess. Life’s a mess. You are not entitled to expect anything from it. Life is not fair. Everything does not balance out in the end. Life happens, and you have no control over it. Good and bad things happen to you day by day, hour by hour, moment by moment. Your degree is a poor armour against fate.

Don’t expect anything. Erase all life expectancies. Just live. Your life is over as of today. At this point in time, you have grown as tall as you will ever be, you are physically the fittest you will ever be in your entire life and you are probably looking the best that you will ever look. This is as good as it gets. It is all downhill from here. Or up. No one knows.

What does this mean for you? It is good that your life is over.

Since your life is over, you are free. Let me tell you the many wonderful things that you can do when you are free.

The most important is this: do not work.

Work is anything that you are compelled to do. By its very nature, it is undesirable.

Work kills. The Japanese have a term “karoshi”, which means death from overwork. That’s the most dramatic form of how work can kill. But it can also kill you in more subtle ways. If you work, then day by day, bit by bit, your soul is chipped away, disintegrating until there’s nothing left. A rock has been ground into sand and dust.

There’s a common misconception that work is necessary. You will meet people working at miserable jobs. They tell you they are “making a living”. No, they’re not. They’re dying, frittering away their fast-extinguishing lives doing things which are, at best, meaningless and, at worst, harmful.

People will tell you that work ennobles you, that work lends you a certain dignity. Work makes you free. The slogan “Arbeit macht frei” was placed at the entrances to a number of Nazi concentration camps. Utter nonsense.

Do not waste the vast majority of your life doing something you hate so that you can spend the small remaining sliver of your life in modest comfort. You may never reach that end anyway.

Resist the temptation to get a job. Instead, play. Find something you enjoy doing. Do it. Over and over again. You will become good at it for two reasons: you like it, and you do it often. Soon, that will have value in itself.

I like arguing, and I love language. So, I became a litigator. I enjoy it and I would do it for free. If I didn’t do that, I would’ve been in some other type of work that still involved writing fiction – probably a sports journalist.

So what should you do? You will find your own niche. I don’t imagine you will need to look very hard. By this time in your life, you will have a very good idea of what you will want to do. In fact, I’ll go further and say the ideal situation would be that you will not be able to stop yourself pursuing your passions. By this time you should know what your obsessions are. If you enjoy showing off your knowledge and feeling superior, you might become a teacher.

Find that pursuit that will energise you, consume you, become an obsession. Each day, you must rise with a restless enthusiasm. If you don’t, you are working.

Most of you will end up in activities which involve communication. To those of you I have a second message: be wary of the truth. I’m not asking you to speak it, or write it, for there are times when it is dangerous or impossible to do those things. The truth has a great capacity to offend and injure, and you will find that the closer you are to someone, the more care you must take to disguise or even conceal the truth. Often, there is great virtue in being evasive, or equivocating. There is also great skill. Any child can blurt out the truth, without thought to the consequences. It takes great maturity to appreciate the value of silence.

In order to be wary of the truth, you must first know it. That requires great frankness to yourself. Never fool the person in the mirror.

I have told you that your life is over, that you should not work, and that you should avoid telling the truth. I now say this to you: be hated.

It’s not as easy as it sounds. Do you know anyone who hates you? Yet every great figure who has contributed to the human race has been hated, not just by one person, but often by a great many. That hatred is so strong it has caused those great figures to be shunned, abused, murdered and in one famous instance, nailed to a cross.

One does not have to be evil to be hated. In fact, it’s often the case that one is hated precisely because one is trying to do right by one’s own convictions. It is far too easy to be liked, one merely has to be accommodating and hold no strong convictions. Then one will gravitate towards the centre and settle into the average. That cannot be your role. There are a great many bad people in the world, and if you are not offending them, you must be bad yourself. Popularity is a sure sign that you are doing something wrong.

The other side of the coin is this: fall in love.

I didn’t say “be loved”. That requires too much compromise. If one changes one’s looks, personality and values, one can be loved by anyone.

Rather, I exhort you to love another human being. It may seem odd for me to tell you this. You may expect it to happen naturally, without deliberation. That is false. Modern society is anti-love. We’ve taken a microscope to everyone to bring out their flaws and shortcomings. It far easier to find a reason not to love someone, than otherwise. Rejection requires only one reason. Love requires complete acceptance. It is hard work – the only kind of work that I find palatable.

Loving someone has great benefits. There is admiration, learning, attraction and something which, for the want of a better word, we call happiness. In loving someone, we become inspired to better ourselves in every way. We learn the true worthlessness of material things. We celebrate being human. Loving is good for the soul.

Loving someone is therefore very important, and it is also important to choose the right person. Despite popular culture, love doesn’t happen by chance, at first sight, across a crowded dance floor. It grows slowly, sinking roots first before branching and blossoming. It is not a silly weed, but a mighty tree that weathers every storm.

You will find, that when you have someone to love, that the face is less important than the brain, and the body is less important than the heart.

You will also find that it is no great tragedy if your love is not reciprocated. You are not doing it to be loved back. Its value is to inspire you.

Finally, you will find that there is no half-measure when it comes to loving someone. You either don’t, or you do with every cell in your body, completely and utterly, without reservation or apology. It consumes you, and you are reborn, all the better for it.

Don’t work. Avoid telling the truth. Be hated. Love someone.

-Adrian Tan, 2008.

Photo credit: Adam D. @ Flickr

January 28, 2014
I Lost A Friend Today

I lost an old friend today. She wasn’t my best friend, she wasn’t even really a “good” friend, but she was a friend. We’d shared drinks before, shared laughs, we’d even had little chats about life and love and all the funny things in between.

It’s been about 3 years since I’ve seen her, but every few days I’d see something about her on Facebook, either hiking through Europe, or trekking through South America, or eating something weird in Asia.

However today I didn’t read about her on Facebook. I read about her in the newspaper. At the ripe age of 28, she was discovered dead in her home, cause of death unknown.

Her name was Ying. I first met her at a leadership conference, where she wasn’t a participant like I had been, but a mentor. I still remember on the second day she went up front to speak for the first time, and as soon as she got hold of the mic screamed “How’s everybody going!!!!!” It was deafening. But that was her personality – big, loud and always smiling. It was at this conference that my life changed infinitely for the better. I realised I didn’t have to settle for second best. I realised that I was capable of being more than an accountant. I realised that people were not measured by their university degree or their bankroll, but by their ability to inspire and enlighten others to be the best that they could be. I’ll always be grateful for the part she played in that.

So many people complain these days that life sucks and work sucks and I wish I could do this and wish I could do that. Ying was one of the few who had the balls to non conform and just do it. Talk is cheap. There’s nothing to admire in sitting in a cubicle everyday talking about your imaginary better future. Ying didn’t sell out to a society that told her her dreams were not good enough and an office was her only acceptable choice. She was one of the few who had the courage to live life to the max, on her own terms, and I’ll forever admire her for that.

Life is so very fragile and unfair. How the universe allows such a bright life to be taken at such a young age is incomprehensible, but it is also a brutal reminder that our time on this Earth is finite. There is no sense in saying that we will do it next year, or next week, or tomorrow, because there is never a guarantee that you will make it that far in the first place. Nor do we have the luxury of assuming that we will.

The news left me numb for most of the day. I shed a few tears, and then as soon as Mum came home I told her I loved her, much to her surprise I’m sure, and then I simply sat in my desk chair, thinking about my life and all the regrets I’d have if I died in my sleep tonight. The sad thing is, I’ll probably wake up tomorrow and nothing will change. I won’t go bungy jumping, I won’t sit on the beach and appreciate the waves. I’ll just sit in this chair and do the same stupid shit I did today. Or maybe I won’t.

“When was the last time time you did something for the first time?”

For me, it’ll be today.

R.I.P. old friend. The world will miss you, but you continue to live on through the inspiration you gave to all of us.

Bren

Photo credit: MissTurner @ Flickr

December 18, 2013
The Wisdom Of A Fisherman

This is a story that was written in Tim Ferriss’ book, The 4 Hour Work Week. So simple and so true. It might make you feel stupid like it did me, but sometimes that’s exactly what we need – someone to tell us that we really aren’t that smart. Enjoy!

An American businessman took a vacation to a small coastal Mexican village on doctor’s orders. Unable to sleep after an urgent phone call from the office the first morning, he walked out to the pier to clear his head. A small boat with just one fisherman had docked, and inside the boat were several large yellowfin tuna. The American complimented the Mexican on the quality of his fish.

“How long did it take you to catch them?” the American asked.

“Only a little while,” the Mexican replied in surprisingly good English.

“Why don’t you stay out longer and catch more fish?” the American then asked.

“I have enough to support my family and give a few to friends,” the Mexican said as he unloaded them into a basket.

“But… What do you do with the rest of your time?

The Mexican looked up and smiled. “I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take a siesta with my wife, Julia, and stroll into the village each evening, where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos. I have a full and busy life, señor.”

The American laughed and stood tall. “Sir, I’m a Harvard M.B.A. and can help you. You should spend more time fishing, and with the proceeds, buy a bigger boat. In no time, you could buy several boats with the increased haul. Eventually, you would have a fleet of fishing boats.”

He continued, “Instead of selling your catch to a middleman, you would sell directly to the consumers, eventually opening your own cannery. You would control the product, processing, and distribution. You would need to leave this small coastal fishing village, of course, and move to Mexico City, then to Los Angeles, and eventually to New York City, where you could run your expanded enterprise with proper management.

The Mexican fisherman asked, “But, señor, how long will all this take?”

To which the American replied, “15-20 years, 25 tops.”

“But what then, señor?”

The American laughed and said, “That’s the best part. When the time is right, you would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich. You would make millions.”

“Millions señor? Then what?”

“Then you would retire and move to a small coastal fishing village, where you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take a siesta with your wife, and stroll in to the village in the evenings where you could sip wine and play your guitar with your amigos…”

From The 4 Hour Work Week by Tim Ferriss.

Looking for more great books to read? I list all the books I’ve read, with a short review, at brenontheroad.com/booklist.

December 13, 2013