I am no longer here

CONTEMPLATION NOW BEGINNING,
KEEP THE RYTHYM FLOWING...

I am no longer here. People see me and hug me and and converse with me, but it is clear to me that I am no longer here.

I am already on the road. The wind is in my face, my clothes are dusty, and I am in need of a bath and a place to sleep. I am happy.

My reading list grows: Anais Nin, Anthony DeMello, more Kerouac, Thoreau, Carlos Castaneda, the Gnostics....."Into the Wild", holy cow what a powerful movie.....and of course my dear old friend Coelho....the books, it seems, are finding me.

Financial reports that used to be my daily reading fill my InBox and are deleted with nary a second thought. Instead, I devour tales from the road of spiritual journeys and adventure. Paulo Coelho writes as though he is speaking directly to my soul; I am lost in his tales of magic and discovery...

Responsibilities and commitments that I have made are in danger of falling to the wayside, and it gets more difficult with each passing day to focus on those tasks. Let me wander in nature instead!

I fall into a conversation with a visiting fellow soul-searcher who is interested in learning about investing in real estate. That part of my brain launches into automatic dialogue with him about how I got started and succeeded, mistakes I've made that he doesn't have to, current market conditions, etc etc etc ....and I observe myself with a curious detachment and voyeuristic fascination at how a topic that was once so exciting to me has become so dull....in spite of the knowledge and familiarity that I have accumulated in that area.

Money no longer interests me. Life interests me. What is right in front of me, at any given moment, has become fascinating.

A butterfly fluttered its way into the shop I was watching yesterday, and I watched in simple amazement as he browsed all the antique furniture and buddha statues that fill the showroom.

I find myself looking forward to the next time I am riding my motorcycle, or sailing on the ocean with the salty breeze in my face, or breathing the cool mountain air on a hike somewhere, or diving into the azure waters below Diamond Head...

And cooking dinner! I forgot how much I enjoy creating something delicious, experimenting in my skillet to blend flavors and textures and cultures....

And sharing coffee and conversations with loved ones...loving and accepting them for who they are vs who you would like them to be...meeting new people who are on similar journeys of discovery, and sharing the awe in their eyes as the simple beauty of life unfolds around us...

My life looks so much different today than it did two years ago. Looking back at my writings, I realize that I began to explore creation vs consumption, contribution vs accumulation years ago, as I was building towards my first million...and now that I have let go and have nothing, I get to immerse myself in that exploration.

What would it be like to live without money? The question is not so much could I do it....more so, how can I do it? Since I've torn down my life to its bare foundations, I get to rebuild however I want to:

What passions do I want to follow? What do I want to experience? Will I retreat into the wild? Will I come back? Who will I be when I come back? I get to come up with answers to these every day!

"The less I have, the happier I am."
-"Ingrid", my 80-year old muse and monthly lunchdate

Indeed.

HONOLULU INTERNATIONAL AIRPORT,
ONE OF MY FAVORITE PLACES ON EARTH...