Tag: New Zealand

Journey’s Beginning: There are no ends

We’re born alone, we live alone, we die alone. Only through our love and friendship can we create the illusion for the moment that we’re not alone.

Orson Welles

The Beginning?

So here we are again, at the beginning. Or is it the end? I am trying to find myself. My decisions, my choices have led here to this moment. And I am proud, but I am also broken. I have held the world on my shoulders for too long and it has left me hollow, an echo of my childhood self. The kid who dreamed, the kid who sang, and the kid who never gave up. The kid who wanted the world to be a better place only to watch his heroes die and the shadows infest the very flame that burned so bright.

The Cycle Ends

To be fair, the last ten years have seen tremendous growth in my life. A lot of tough choices and no easy answers. I understand myself and know I cannot exist as I am. I came back home and said goodbye to my Dad as alcohol consumed him. My once hero became my sparring partner and truth be told I’ve been lost without him. In another reality he never touched a bottle and I could spend this portion of my life asking him advice, having him guide me in an uncertain world. Instead, I can visit his grave and hope he is watching over me. My questions are told to an urn as I slowly lose my mind.

As I prepare for New Zealand, I’ve been spending a lot of time with my friends. Beers on the weekends, game nights, and running. I’m grateful that I’ve nurtured these relationships over decades and have the capacity to create new ones. I’ve been treating my working visa as if I’m on my deathbed and it’s made me appreciate what I have all the more.

What I’ve been missing in my life has been hope and love which has proven to be my undoing. When I was younger, I wish I had appreciated the love I had, because I never realized that one day it would be gone. I was reminded the other day what it means to still have a heart that beats and as I feel the blood slowly come back into my body, I leave my life in the hands of the fates. I want to believe it will all work out as it was meant to even as I watch my once safe world crumble before my eyes. Life is tough but worth living.

The Cycle Begins

This chapter of my life is about finding myself and perhaps even building a new fire from within. New Zealand is my hard reset. It has forced my hand to lay a foundation of success. I have a long ways to go before I’m ready but everything is in motion. I have sacrificed pleasure for the past 6 months to have enough money saved up to pay off my student loans. We are here; after this month they will be gone. Now my focus has shifted towards personal finance; I don’t just want to survive, I want to thrive. I’ve started looking at credit card usage, have been investing for the last year, and am planning to get a second credit card before I head overseas. I’ve cut subscription costs since the pandemic and now only have what I use on a consistent basis. The other path to success has been focusing on my skillset and knowing my value; versatility will be king if I am to spend the next couple years traveling. New Zealand, Ireland, and Japan is my current three year plan; when I next arrive in the US, I will be a different man.

For my US send off and to end my twenties on a high note, I opted to run a half marathon. Since I started my training back in April, I can now run 13 miles with relative ease and the next couple months will be focused on getting faster. Physically, I feel better than I did when I ran cross country and it seems fitting that as I get ready for the next decade, I reconnect with an activity that has given me so much joy over the years.

Living my Dreams

Since an early age, I have wanted to travel and experience the world. I achieved this dream when I did study abroad in Mosbach, Germany. This time, it’ll be New Zealand and it’s all on me. Housing, Work, and a one way plane ticket. What better way to spend my first year as a thirty year old? As I get closer to October, the more excited I become. And what’s even better is I’ll finally get to write about travel once more. I’m also planning to bring my camera, so I’ll be trying to get out and take as many photos as I can while I’m overseas. Just me, in a land of strangers. It’s just what the doctor ordered and it’s one of those few moments in life that just makes sense. While I can take a small breath with my student loans, these next couple months will be crucial. I am focused and I am motivated, so bring it world.

And that’s a wrap. If you had asked me a year ago that my crazy dream of traveling and living abroad once more would become reality, I would have wondered if it would ever work. Does lightning strike twice? Apparently it does. So this year will be a busy year! Luckily, all I need to blog is a computer and an internet connection! Cheers to the future and get ready for more travel content as I prepare for my trip!

June 2023 Newsletter: change is in the air

So it’s that time again. Another month, another newsletter. This month is going to be a big one, so strap in and get ready. But first…

Mental Health Awareness Month

So series take a bit to write. Just because I have an idea doesn’t mean it’ll get published in time. I had a few articles in the pipeline that just didn’t quite make it into the series and that is okay. This last month I talked about my birth defect and it felt good; it was a huge mental health milestone for me! Later in the month I wanted to talk about Men in modern society and talk about overcoming exhaustion but alas, the month ended before I could finish either article. But all-in-all, a success.

Remember to take time for your mental health, it’s important! A lot of the work is messy and takes a concentrated effort but is well worth it. Remember to check in with your friends, it’s rough out there and be kind to yourself.

How is Mike’s Life?

About to go nuclear. Today I achieved my first major adulting milestone and that is having enough in my savings to pay off my student loans. I shed a single tear and felt the sun for the first time in a decade. My thoughts have, in a moment, shifted entirely towards the future. And the future is New Zealand. It is crazy to think I am five months away and I cannot be more excited. Speaking of the future…

Subscriber only posts and other musings

So, I’ve had this blog for eight years now and I’ve been blogging for ten. This is a personal blog and I’ve been doing everything on my own since the beginning. All posts have been free up to this point. I’ve played around with Patreon and Ko-fi as well as other revenue streams but ultimately decided not to worry about it as the blog started as a way for myself to improve my communication skills. Now, as I prep for New Zealand, I realize extra money from writing would be fantastic. So starting this month, some of the posts on the blog will be subscriber only. Right now the plan is to have the newsletter and the first post of the month free, with additional posts each month set aside for subscribers. As such, very little will change, as I’ve typically only be doing a newsletter and an article. The paid content will hopefully encourage me to write more and add a bonus each month for those who really love the content. I’m going to start with $5 a month as I think that’s fair but I’m going to play around to see what works best. I’m also going to start adding the donation button to the bottom of each newsletter in case anyone wants to help out without having to subscribe.

Marketing

Marketing, hooray! Marketing is an ongoing battle with this blog. For the last couple years, I’ve opted for a Facebook page (thank God I gave up on Twitter) and the WordPress reader. And the growth, while great has been slow. So, this year, I’m going to work on the marketing and my hope is it’ll bring more traffic to the blog. And also remember, word of mouth is the best marketing! So if you enjoy my content remember to tell your friends!

Other Fun Stuff with Mike’s Life

Half marathon training is going well and I feel in better shape than I did in high school. Coding is now a focus! With New Zealand fast approaching, I’ve been finishing up my coding lessons before AI takes over. I’ve also befriended chatGPT, in case it does become world ending.

And that’s a wrap! Life is busy right now but we are in the home stretch! Also, next month is sustainability month!

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New Year, New Mike: A Year of New Beginnings

So this is the year. The gears have been turning for a while now and everything has lined up. It is time to hit the reset button. My crazy fever dream is just beginning. As of writing this, my working holiday visa application to New Zealand has been accepted. I have been working a new job for over a month now and I plan to fully commit to running a half marathon.

So this year, my resolution post is going to be formatted a little differently. I have been heavily goal focused for the last 3 or 4 years now. This year, I wanted to take some time to go over life and some of the reasons behind the big changes.

When Life Loses its flavor

So for a while now I’ve been trying to avert certain disaster and I’ve just been barely able to keep my head above water so I don’t drown. Along the way the world has brought me to my knees. A lot. And each time I have gotten back up. As a consequence, life has lost a lot of its flavor. I try to feel with my whole heart and there is barely a pulse left. On the outside I’m posed with purpose but on the inside I can feel myself imploding like a dying star. The hope is that when I finally go super nova, the energy released breaths life into a New Mike.

The Long Journey

This year, I want to be more honest when it comes to love and that comes with acknowledging where I’m at. When I was young I thought I’d be married by 29 or at least in a relationship. Not drifting aimlessly and not lost to the darkness. My personal growth has seen me invest heavily in friendships and self-love, all of which I have in abundance. It even saw me coming back home and reconciling with my family. Now, my life lives in paradox. I am both surrounded by people and love but am also alone.

The Goal

This year, I want to reset and I want to just let love happen (well, not entirely, I do have a plan). To do this I cannot walk the path alone. So instead of hopping back on dating apps, I’m going to explore why I’ve been single for so long. And as such, it’s time for a dating coach. I have also relayed to my friends if they have any single friends they know to send them my way. I remember what love felt like when I was younger and want to learn how to recapture that energy. It’ll also be a year of dating books and podcasts as I seek to understand what love is and where it fits in my life. The hope is to make the process more fun and less work and while my “Year of Desire” went a long way for getting back on the saddle, there is still much to be done.

A Focus on Imperfection

This year I’ll be exploring imperfection and learning to find the beauty in it. My whole life has been spent obsessed with perfection. I thought if I didn’t follow a certain path, I’d end up like my father. In truth, I was partly right. I became obsessed with mental health in college and set down a journey of constant improvement that has made me a better man. And yet, here I find myself drifting. I feel shame and find myself in a state where I’m never truly vulnerable. The walls I thought I had torn down are in fact, still there. Why can’t I talk about my craniosynostosis? Why can’t I talk about my romantic failures? Why am I still so conflicted over my childhood? I thought being the best I could be would propel me forward in life but it didn’t, so maybe it’s time I look at the imperfections that make up so many parts of life.

The Concrete Goals

This year, the goals are practical. They are boxes to be marked that will prepare me for my journey in life and in the near future, New Zealand.

Running

My long neglected bastion. The one thing that has always given me peace in this world. It has always been there and is a measure of who I am. So it’s time to propel it into my adult life with a half marathon. The plan is to run the bridge of the Gods in the Cascades come August 6th and this time I have the tools I need. Nike Run Club has a fitness coach and has a 14 week half marathon running plan, guidance I have been sorely missing since high school. I’m going to try to get a friend to do it with me and it should be a nice send off before I live in New Zealand.

Coding

Ah, the journey I started on during the pandemic and what has been an on again, off again relationship. Coding skills I need, there is no way around this fact. My problem is I’ll do a little and then lose motivation, even though I find the concepts interesting. If I learned to code, this would open up a world of possibilities for me professionally and now I have the perfect catalyst; yup, you guessed it, my journey to New Zealand. I have a Codecademy subscription and the program is being vastly expanded, so it’s time I jump back in. My goal is 8 to 10 hours a week as I believe this amount of time is what I need to have some professionally ready skills by the time I live overseas. While communication is my forte, I want a true technical skill to fall back on.

All Other Goals

With great effort, my goals from years past have formed into stable habits. The journey may not be perfect, but I no longer feel the need to put cooking, biking, language learning, and piano on here. I practice them enough and am slowly building a strong lifestyle of having them integrated into my everyday. This year is for the big goals and I have no more time to dally.

The Human Capital Question

This year will also have a renewed focused on revenue streams, which means trying new things as well as looking back at the old.

Freelancing

In New Zealand, I’ll be a casual or part-time worker. As such, I want to have as much at my disposal as I can. That means not relying on one stream of revenue. Imagine making money part-time and then freelance writing on top of that. This in fact may lead to my return to social media, in a professional capacity. I’m still looking at the logistics but I really want to make freelancing work; not as a sole source of income but as an additional revenue path.

Sponsorships

I am officially considering sponsored content. Currently I am in the early stages of looking at how it would work but the idea popped in my head when I got a random email asking for brand ambassadors. I figured if there’s a product I’m using a lot, it could be fun to have the occasional sponsored article. After ten years of writing, I think it’s time I start at least exploring content like this.

Contests

Contests I have also been very curious about for a while now. Enter a fiction contest, win a cash prize. Easy, straightforward and what I hope to be fun. It’ll be a good incentive to invest more time into my writing and since I’ve been writing short stories for a bit now, it seems like a good time to jump in now that I have a general sense of where I want my life to go.

And that is my current roadmap for the upcoming year. It’s time to usher in the next chapter and fully enter adulthood. It’ll require a look at relationships, myself, and my professional capital. Last years goals helped establish a good lifestyle so now I’m making one last push to live as the best version of myself. I’m excited to see what this year brings. And as always, thanks for reading!

Duolingo: One Angry Owl

I have foregone many a day without practice. Late in the evenings, a chill goes down my spine. A feeling as though I’m being watched and an impending dread looms. I hear noises shuffle about in the darkness and remember that I have yet to complete my lessons. My phone buzzes but there is no response.

If you’ve been with this blog for a while, you are aware of my love for travel and languages. So it may come as a surprise that I have not been practicing. It shames me to utter such words. I have bursts of inspiration to practice and then nothing. No French, No Spanish, No German. On the flip side, I’ve been speaking Spanish at work. So there is some practice. Recently, there’s been a change in my life and with it comes new motivations and plans. With no debt, I am free to travel and explore. I am [now] This week I’ll be turning 29 and this means the window on doing a holiday working visa is closing. If all goes well, I’ll be living in New Zealand in 2023. If things go really well, I’ll live in Ireland by the time I turn 30. The year beyond I hope to spend a year in Japan to teach English.

It’s The perfect time

I have talked very little about my current life. I have given updates here and there but for the most part have keep relatively quiet. Right now I am working four jobs (Welcome Desk Associate, Event Planning Assistant, Rock Climbing Instructor, and Child Care Specialist); over the summer, I was a Summer Day Camp Counselor. This puts me in a relatively unique position for the twilight of my twenties where I am beholden to no company and my ties to one area over another are almost nonexistent. I am also single, which bodes well for travel. It’s a now or never sort of situation, where things seem to just line up. If I work in a foreign country I am more or less in a spot where I can be highly adaptable with my work experience.

What does this Have to Do with an Angry Owl?

I’ve decided to pick up Japanese again with this 3 year plan. New Zealand and Ireland I need not worry about the language as they speak English over there. Japan I’d feel more at home knowing the language. This last month has been decent thus far with my language endeavors. Off and on as I work my way out of gold league and back to more competitive ranks in Duolingo. So now I have a less Angry, more disappointed owl.

Life Dictates Motivation

Part of the issue I have is motivation. I am a practical man and also very much a planner. I seem to have a proclivity for language and am lucky in the sense that languages fascinate me. Most would not even attempt to learn another language but I love it. My assessment this last year has been looking into proficiency. It is one thing to appreciate language, it’s another to understand and hold conversation. It wasn’t until I started speaking Spanish at work that I realized I can be quite proud of all I’ve accomplished. It is not perfect but more often than not there is recognition in the eyes of those I speak with.

A Hostel of a Time

Quite recently, I was up in Seattle for my old College Roommates wedding. While there, I realized Airbnb and Hotels were ridiculously expensive. So I opted for a hostel, which I haven’t done since Germany! It was there I met a few Danish girls and a German couple. This had been the first time I’ve spoken German with native speakers since I left 5 years ago. They were impressed so surely Duo will have mercy on my soul!

A Little help from a friend

Out of the blue, one of my old co-workers reached out to me on Duolingo! I started learning Japanese and apparently he is doing the same! It’s a new experience for me to have a language learning buddy that is in the same boat as I am! Duolingo has quite recently added missions and I’m feeling pretty motivated to complete those as a way to earn extra experience. It’s a fun time in my language journey and between Spanish, Latin, German, Japanese, and French I think I have a pretty good base.

And that’s it! I’ve been wanting to talk about travel once again for a while now! With my language habits I figured now would be as good a time as any! As I learn more Japanese I’m sure I’ll have more to say but for now it’ll be grouped in with my other languages! Cheers and I hope everyone continues to learn and grow!