It has been a strange 18 months. Well, to be honest, it has been a strange eight years. I lost the world’s best marriage and the world’s best job in the same month. It was a body blow that took me years to reconcile – if I have actually reconciled. I’m 65 now, so the likelihood of a new career or marriage are low.
Living alone, no job, no real future of substance… How, at my age, do I add vitality to my life. Something that creates challenge, excitement, a bit of fear, a risk of failure. Something to really test me. Something, that if I nail it, can create intense satisfaction and joy – in others, sharing my experience, and in me?
I woke up one morning, three years ago, and said to myself, “I am going to drive to London. How hard can that be?” And then, “There is nothing stopping me doing what I want, being the person I want to be. Writing my own narrative. Creating my own joy, from my own achievements. And then maybe using these achievements to inspire others”. My journey.
I mentioned this to a few people. I know some people thought… “here we go. Miles has had another crazy, wacky idea. He’ll be ok next week.” All a bit underwhelming. Then of course came the ‘what if I get sick, robbed, stabbed, beaten up, kidnapped, lost at sea, lost on land, have an accident…’ All things, I tried to point out, that happen in Sydney most days of the week.
Bad things might happen. But some pretty awful things happen anywhere. And the alternative?? An old bloke on my own, with nothing to look forward to and nothing substantial to achieve? A fast way to the grave.
I scoured YouTube and various blogs. It was possible – I knew how do it. People have done it. I set myself a project. I found a suitable vehicle, I spent a year fitting it out with what I believe I will need to manage most environments. I did a 4WD course. I went camping, for the first time since 1978. I researched, understood and implemented all the administrative activities required to take a vehicle, and me, across 40 countries.
And suddenly the impossible became in my mind possible. Achievable. I can do this. I know how. I have the common sense to pull this off. Most of all, though, I have a sense of adventure. I am comfortable (very comfortable) putting myself outside my comfort zone. I love finding the unknown.
And then about 2 months ago, something very unexpected happened. Maybe I didn’t know just how unhappy I was. But… one day, out of nowhere, I felt happy and proud. I’d forgotten how good that felt. The contrast to what I was used to feeling was dramatic. What I was achieving was not a drive across the world. For me it felt like something way bigger… something far more life defining. Something that might actually change me, save me even… from myself.
That’s what happened, and that’s the why. Now I am underway. I am a week out of Sydney in the Flinders Ranges – ideal as I can reflect now. I am doing a lap of Australia to test me, mostly, and my equipment. In June, I depart Darwin for Timor Leste.
Why am I doing this?? It’s become a lot more than just an adventure. As it write this and conceive what my future might look like, I see there could be three elements to this.
- I want to share my travel experiences. A good old fashioned travel blog. I will be going to some of the most beautiful, the most challenging, the most uncertain and unstable places in the world. I want to take people along on that journey, to show you how I arrived there, what I did to stay safe, and how I managed to always laugh and enjoy myself. I want to share all of my adventures.
- I’d like to talk about my own personal journey – the old bloke with not much in his future, and who lived for a time with regret, despair and disappointment as daily companions. Being 60+, especially if you are single and have job challenges, is tougher than anything else I’ve experienced. Now I am in control of my own narrative. I am not there yet (whatever ‘there’ is), but I see how I can get there. Maybe my story can help someone who, now, is like the man I was.
- The last one is a little more idealistic. Maybe even fanciful. I want to go on a search for joy. Not my joy – this adventure shouldn’t be about me. I want to meet as many amazing and interesting people as I can. Wherever I can. Particularly, I want to search for joy. For joyful people. Our world is hardly joyful, because joy can be hard to find. Why is that? What’s happened? In fact, what is joy? Where do joyful people live? What makes them joyful? How do they stay joyful?
How can we understand the joy these people in far away places enjoy, so that we can make individuals, groups or even populations, perhaps in more advanced economies, understand what joy is? How can we allow these groups to harness and build joy within themselves?
It’s lofty, I know. But if I search under every stone, surely I’ll find a few gems. Turn that on its head though – if I don’t look, I’ll never find it. I’ll just be another apathetic traveller, passing through being unconnected to where I am.
Everyone must have an ideal in their life.
So that’s me. If you’re interested in seeing where I go, what I do, who I meet and what I achieve, then I’ll be here.
I hope you enjoy this journey, well these three parallel journeys.