Phases of Humanity

The Secret Chiefs 3: (Me, Kiki, and my Kia)

I don’t think I’ll ever find another video where I felt more free.  

I turned 22 on November 9th, 2016, the day after Donald Trump was elected as POTUS, and I was stuck in Georgia paying a speeding ticket I’d gotten from a previous trip to Florida about a month before. I made sure that $600 for a speeding ticket was going to have one heck of a journey to go along with it. 

Day 1:

I’d visited Helen, GA: A small mountain town in North-eastern Georgia where there were mannequins standing in funnel-cake stands, German restaurants full of skin-head motorcyclists, and a giant Confederate flag hanging over the courthouse. 

I met a cool guy named Christian at the record store in Athens, GA: This is where I picked up perhaps the best road-trip music material after meeting the first guy in real life that I’ve seen actually drinking LaCroix when it first made internet fame. It inspired me to pick up a new CD in every new record store I’d find, but it’s really hard to top Aphex Twin and David Bowie when it comes to variety.

Day 2:

I saw a miniature Grand Canyon in a place called “Providence Canyon State Park” on the way to paying my ticket in a small town in the midst of cotton-fields. I don’t remember the name of where the ticket was because I spent the least time there. I think I used their wifi at Subway and that was about it. (Fun Fact: Subways are more common in small towns than McDonalds!)

Rather than head back home right away, I decided to go to Mobile, Alabama to meet my good friend, Mia who was living there with her boyfriend Jesse. I had met her 2 weeks prior at a hostel in Asheville, and we liked each other enough to meet up again for an election party that wasn’t in our favor!

Day 3:

Mia: “Have you ever been to New Orleans? It’s only 2 hours away.”

Me: *Leaves Mobile at 5 AM in order to make it to New Orleans in time for a quick beignet and an encounter with voodoo people and still have enough time to drive allllll the way back to Charlotte in time for work the next day*

I drove to New Orleans, decided it was scary after seeing so many homeless drug addicts, didn’t feel safe and decided to avoid the entire state of Georgia on the way back home as a way of saying that I gave them enough money already. In order to get back to Charlotte, I had to drive through the Smoky Mountains in Tennessee which were on fire and then pass through pitch-black mountain roads in North Carolina when I was super tired and needed to constantly be on the phone to stay awake. 

In total, I passed through South Carolina, North Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, and Tennessee all in 3 days. 

Moving Forward and Freely by Letting Go of Your Past

(October 16, 2017 @ 5AM)

It is so important to break bonds with people and things that are bad for you. One of the hardest challenges I am consistently faced with in my life is picking people who lift me up over picking people that need lifting. 

Just like you should spend your money wisely, you need to spend your time and energy wisely too. Spending your time thinking about the past and cyberstalking your exes for hours is wasting energy on people who are no longer part of your life for a reason. It’s essentially like throwing your precious energy and time in the trash because you have nothing to gain from seeing a picture of them and feeling sad about it. They’re having the time of their life without you, probably not even thinking about you at all, and meanwhile, you’re only thinking about them and watching instead of doing the same thing yourself. Why let them have all the fun? Stop caring and start doing your own thing. If they can move on and become better people, so can you.

One of the motivating factors that lead me to travel was so that I could be with someone I had my eye on for years, but I realize now that if it worked out the way I wanted it to, we would have held each other back and I actually would have gone nowhere that I wanted to go and would have missed out on meeting a lot of awesome people. We were supposed to be on different paths because we had different challenges we needed to overcome on our own and we needed to explore our own individuality independently at this time in our lives. 

I’ve learned that you can never really forget the past because it makes you who you are, and the memories will always return eventually, but what you can do is start living in the present moment and look forward to the future instead of remaining stuck thinking about what you could have done differently to make it work. It didn’t, and nothing you would have done could have changed that. Accept it, forgive, and move onto the next lesson. 

Everyone has their excuses to why they can’t go somewhere whether it’s “not enough money,” or “the world’s a dangerous place.” Yeah, traveling CAN be expensive and no doubt, it can be dangerous *especially* for a woman traveling alone. Plane tickets can be costly depending on when and where you are flying to and from. That’s why it’s smart to think about visiting those places in the off-season, to brainstorm about different methods of taking the journey to get there, and to minimize your spending on comfort in order to still get the experience of a lifetime. 

I’ve started going places and exploring as much of each place as I can in short amounts of time for about a year now. At 21 Yrs old, it hit me that I didn’t want to pay rent anymore, and I was ready to get out of a routine lifestyle of waking up, going to work, and then working at my next job just so I could pay rent into a bottomless pit that would keep me stuck in the same place for a long time. My purpose to life then was to work in order to sleep in a place that wasn’t my parents’ house and  I thought that was the only option for freedom, but it isn’t. 

I kept myself in a relationship that neither of us were truly happy in just because we thought it felt more “secure” than living by ourselves. I was living with people I was familiar with, but that didn’t mean they did anything for my wellbeing. The only person you can rely on for that is yourself. 

So when it was time to finally break free from the mold of the standard “move out of your parents’ house as soon as you can, work and go to school and do nothing that feeds your soul in order to achieve that, living paycheck to paycheck and always in debt” I did what I needed to do to get out of this town, and I achieved that in multiple different ways. 

1.) I stopped going to school, broke up with my boyfriend, moved back in with my parents, and quit my second job. 

Around the end of August 2016, I finally decided that I had enough of being unhappy and not living my fullest life, so I stopped wasting time in a classroom and learning how to fit myself into a mold. That’s what most 21 year-olds are doing, but not me. 

Most 21-year-olds are dating and a lot are living with whomever that might be, but be careful who you spend the most time with because that’s who you end up becoming. If you’re living with someone dealing with a lot of stress, anxiety, repressed anger, and depression of their own, you take that on yourself too, but you’re never the one to cure their unhappiness no matter how hard you try. You start feeling the physical effects of their unhappiness for problems that are not even your own. If you feel that you’re no longer growing from a relationship, it’s best to end that union and grow from letting go. In this case, leaving my comfort zone was the only best option there was. 

I didn’t like living with my parents because I felt like I was taking a step backwards instead of forward and I felt that it was a loss of pride and independence for even needing their help, but this was the most practical and affordable option. Not wanting to be home was also a motivating factor in taking spontaneous day-trips to new cities all the time.

Quitting my second job partly came from not being close enough to it anymore when I moved out of my ex-boyfriend’s apartment, but also came from wanting to have time to have a social life now that I didn’t have anyone that I was guaranteed to spend time with every day. Rather than working from 6 AM to 3PM and then sitting in 2 hours of traffic to be at work by 5 PM and work sometimes til 2 AM, I was working the morning job and then having time to rest in the middle of the day before spending time at bars and going out by myself to leave myself open and vulnerable to the possibility of meeting new people. 

This helped free up some much neglected time for myself while also freeing myself of the chains I had to different obligations in my life that I was dedicating most of my time and money to.

2.) I applied to flight attendant jobs. 

The first step to anything is to take the first step. You aren’t going to get anywhere if you just expect something to happen without doing anything about it yourself. You need to get the ball rolling, so my first thought to how I would achieve traveling for cheap was to apply to be a flight attendant, so I applied to three different airlines realizing that it didn’t hurt to try, got an in-person interview to every airline I applied for, and got to go to two new cities I’d never been to for free of charge.

I’d never been to New York City before, and I’d never been to Denver either. Those two cities were places that were on the radar for dream destinations for a lot of people my age, and I was fortunate enough to take those trips for almost free. 

While I was in New York and taking public city transportation by myself for the first time,  I met Nick, a photographer from San Francisco who’d surprisingly also never been to NYC. He’d never taken the New York subway himself either, but I trusted him as my guide to help me meet up with my friend, Taylor who was living his dream as a furniture designer. While we were navigating around the tunnels and trains, Nick told me about AirBnb and how it allowed him to stay in places like New York for much cheaper while getting a way more authentic and unique experience than what a hotel might offer him. 

Before I knew about this app, I’d already booked my hotels in advance in the cities I had interviews in, and I thought “Wow, I could have met so many more interesting people if I was staying at a hostel or an Airbnb. I’m never using hotels again.”

I didn’t get any of the jobs I applied for, but I learned a lot from the interviewing process, and it helped me meet people I never would have met who all taught me something valuable and important to take along with me on my next adventure. 

I’d have one night booked at a hotel for the interview, spend all night exploring the city when I landed, then all day after the interview until I had to board my next flight back home. Take advantage of what you’re offered and spend each minute you have valuably.

When you get to go to a new place that’s not close to home, explore it like you’re never coming back and do things that you wouldn’t be able to do anywhere else. (That means instead of spending your money at chain restaurants and fast food, buy from a local farmers market to experience the food grown in that area or eat at a restaurant that’s acclaimed by the locals.)

3.) When I wasn’t working, I was road-tripping at every opportunity, going as far as I would be able to travel in the time off I was given.

When you only have a limited amount of time to be somewhere, you should be spending it the best way you can. I would squeeze as much as I could out of a place whether I had 2 hours there or 2 weeks. Time wasn’t wasted watching television and movies, watching other people lead adventurous lives, it was spent having my own adventures and recording my own movies. 

If I had two days off in a row at work, I’d be gone as soon as I got off work, on the way to my next little vacation. I’d only be gone during the week, and never have weekends off anyways because I was working in a restaurant and those were the only days I’d make any significant amount of money to fund these adventures. I was traveling on days that weren’t as traveled, so that meant less traffic and less opportunity for me to travel with anyone who would be off on the same days.

4.) I cut out the expenses of traveling in comfort and style and traded it for minimalism and adventure. 

After I was informed in New York about staying in an Airbnb, I only used Airbnb and would stay in strangers’ houses or hostels frequently. From meeting people in hostels, I’d learn about couch-surfing, camping, and sleeping in your car in Walmart parking lots. I’d meet people from all over the world with similar frugal mindsets that utilized everything they had to make traveling possible, and this introduced me to so many more possibilities of cheap travel that I never would have known on my own before. 

I started challenging myself to travel with less to open myself to the possibility of more. Traveling with less luggage saves you money, it saves you time, and if your luggage gets lost or stolen, it’s less likely that you’ll be freaking out because you most likely didn’t lose everything you own. The less attachment you have to material possessions the better, and you’d be amazed at how creative you can get with outfit combinations when you only pack about five shirts instead of twenty.

Pack what you would get the most wear and the most layering combinations with. Whatever you absolutely need when you’ve arrived in your destination that you don’t have already, you can bring home as a unique souvenir if need be, but only buy it if you really want it. 

I also minimized my expenses on bills by cutting out the gym membership, stopping the pointless shopping for the point of instant gratification, finding out what I could do for free in the area which usually involved walking, and trading my smartphone for a basic texting and calling phone with no internet capabilities.

So many people’s biggest bill is their phone bill because they feel like they can’t survive without having the internet and all the answers and endless entertainment at their fingertips. I view data plans as the largest waste of money because free Wifi is so accessible everywhere you go nowadays. If it isn’t, you do what they did “in the old days” and ask a stranger for information. 

We want to know things “right here, right now,” but if it can wait til tomorrow, wait. Time you are spending on wikipedia could be spent having a good conversation or noticing something new right in front of you.

5. I collected moments instead of things.

If I ever did splurge a little with my money while traveling, it was often on an experience rather than souvenir t-shirts and snow globes. Do things that are more valuable in life experience rather than collecting something that costed you a lot of money. If you spent $200 on a dress, you could have gone skydiving. 

My favorite souvenirs are always the pictures and videos that I took while on my trip. Those will last me a lifetime while a dress might only last me for one year that I’m the same size.

6. Think outside the box and always utilize what you have already.

Even though I didn’t get any of the jobs I applied for in the airlines, I got the experience of going through the interview process and know that if I decided to apply again, I could definitely get an interview and knew the right steps to make it to the last round. Without even getting a job, I was still getting free flights, so I took advantage of that in both places that I got to visit, and I networked as much as I could so that I’d know people in new places that I could stay with or hang out with next time I was in that area. 

I never got to fly for a career, but I haven’t cut out the option yet. I’m still open to the eventual possibility of this career path, but I know for right now it’s not what I want to do because it’s all about compliance and conformity when I’m just now experiencing the most freedom I’ve ever tasted and need to relish in that as much as I can. 

I couldn’t fly as frequently as I wanted, but I could drive. I had a car, a driver’s license, and thousands of miles of wide open road to explore on the ground that I’d be missing in an airplane. One of the greatest things about living in America is the uniqueness of the American road-trip and all the interesting small towns and road stops you can explore which make the journey so much more interesting than the destination sometimes. 

I knew that it was easy for me to get jobs in the restaurant industry because I was a great worker and loved to talk to people, so I used that to my advantage by looking for jobs that were in different states through Coolworks.com. It’s a misconception that you need a high-paying or high-skilled job to travel. Sometimes working the odd jobs are more of an eventful experience anyways. Perhaps to travel in luxury, you need a job that pays $50/hr, but there are endless possibilities to where you can go and what jobs you can work in this world that a lot of people aren’t even thinking about.

I got a job in Alaska as a busser, not even a server when I had two years of experience under my belt and was more qualified than some of the servers who had never served in their lives. It was an easy job though, and I was getting almost free rent in a place that I was always dying to see. I wasn’t opposed to working a job that wasn’t the most glamorous and I wasn’t complaining about living in the same house with five other people either because for someone who enjoys her alone time very much, it was impossible to ever get that at home, so it forced me to spend more alone time out and about in nature. Learn to live with what you have, and you’ll be a lot happier when you appreciate every little thing instead of complaining about what you don’t have. 

I learned a lot from my experience in Alaska that I’ll expand on more later, but most of what I learned came from spending time with J1 visa students from Bulgaria and Serbia. They were all on travel-exchange programs that employed them in less-than-desirable positions like housekeeping and dishwashing that most Americans would be too lazy to work themselves or complain about low-pay. To a J1′s perspective though, these are extremely easy jobs that they’d be earning triple the amount of money in working in our country than they would their own, so what was there to complain about when it was an easy way for them to become rich back home?

Because I made so many Serbian friends when I was working in Alaska, I’m going to Serbia for my birthday in November and have four different friends that I can stay with for free. I made use of my surroundings and now I have valuable connections that can take me to new places and meet even more people. I’m creating my own empire now of people who I connect with all over the world, keep in touch, and then always have someone to visit whenever I’m around again.

There’s hardly anywhere I’ve been before where I can’t stay for free because I know at least one person that I met there who I made a friend out of. Most people, if they consider you trustworthy and nice, will at least let you stay on their couch for a night. It’s important to always treat people with kindness and respect and to show your friends that you’re there for them so that they can be there for you too when you need them to be. You can never expect anything from people, but when they do open up their hearts to you, the least you can do is say thank you.