Go Towards What Makes You Happy

Hopefully there's enough sunshine left for this video. I have to wait to film videos until the sun goes down because it's super hot in southern Arizona but here goes nothing. Today's video is for the people on my channel that like to hear my talking videos, that like to hear my voice, that like my podcast-y type videos. Doing this for you baby. Go towards what makes you happy. You see generic quotes like this all the time on Instagram, on Pinterest, Facebook, the internet, all over the place. And that seems kind of general. Like what does that even mean? And what actually makes me happy? I love donuts. Should I move closer to a Krispy Kreme? No. Because the Asian mom and pop shops are 100% better. It took me a long time to figure out what actually makes me happy. Honestly, I'm still not sure exactly what it is that makes me happy. Is it road trips? Is it being out in nature? Is it the freedom that I feel being on the road? Is it the physical act of driving? I don't know. What I do know is that two years ago when I was living in LA I was not happy. But at that time I found some van lifers on YouTube that really inspired me. I believe at the time it was Kaya Cloudsurfer who has sadly deleted all trace of herself from the internet and Hobo Alley who does not post at all anymore. At the time seeing these two young women who were living in vehicles alone by themselves, living free, traveling, that made something in me ignite. It felt like a light bulb had went off in my brain. I was so excited that I finally found my passion that I actually hand wrote letters to my family like it was 1952 and mailed them to them and they never wrote me back. But I truly felt like the world was suddenly ripe with possibility. Like I could do anything. So since at the time I could not get a van I decided to convert the car that I had into a camper. And I was definitely hesitant to tear up my one and only vehicle. But I realized that anytime I did any type of work on my car, anytime anytime I was measuring or buying stuff for Car Life to make Car Life easier, I was happy. I was glowing. I was giddy. I was excited. And that's how I knew I was on the right track no matter how scary it seemed. When I told my mom I was moving into my car she was like, I'll give you three weeks. And I was like, I give me three months. Because honestly I didn't know how it was gonna go. I didn't really have that much faith in myself either. But once I moved in and I realized that I was fully capable of living my entire life in a car, I had no reason to ever stop. So I basically never did. Almost two years exactly have gone by since I first moved into my car. And I've lived on and off in a vehicle ever since then. And I can tell you that every time I moved out of my vehicle into temporary traditional housing, I became unhappy. And I didn't like being unhappy. I knew that there were people living in vehicles who would be so grateful to have the opportunity to live in a house even if it was a trailer on an RV park in the middle of nowhere. Which is where I lived the first time I moved out of my car in Oregon because living in a car in Oregon winter was not going to cut it for me. I was not built for that yet. And then of course there was a whole saga where I moved into my brother's apartment for a few months while he was deployed. And I was so unhappy mentally, emotionally, physically. My body was just distressed all the time. So I ended up moving back into my car even though I had a perfectly good apartment to live in. And when I moved back into my car and I started driving from Arizona back up to Oregon, it was like like I could breathe again. I shed the burden of trying to force myself to like living by society's standards and I just did what I wanted and made myself happy. And now, exactly two years later, I'm kind of in the same place again. I'll be honest, I've been in kind of a rut this entire year. And I didn't start waking up until I finally decided, you know what? I am going to yet again throw caution to the wind, invest in my van, and see where it takes me. Originally, I didn't want to spend money on my van. I wanted to save my money and save up for a different vehicle. The van is big and bulky especially compared to my tiny little Chevy Sonic I used to have. It had mechanical issues and then the biggest one for me after getting in two car accidents back to back and totaling my old car is that by today's standards this van is unsafe. If you look up most unsafe car crash test videos, AstroVans are like literally number one. I believe if my van crashes at 30 miles per hour I have a 92% chance of dying. That's basically 100% like just round it up that's a guarantee. And that's going slower than some residential speed limits. So for a while I was just stricken with fear. I had a ton of anxiety getting into my van. I had anxiety with driving. I had anxiety with not knowing if anything was wrong with it because in a modern car like my old car you have a light that comes on for everything. With a van this old you just have to guess. And then on top of all that I was terrified to get in a car accident again. So I just didn't really go anywhere. And then one day I decided that I didn't want to live like that. I didn't want to stay stuck mentally or physically in one place anymore. So I decided that I was going to invest in my van. I made mechanic appointment after mechanic appointment. I started getting inspections by multiple shops so that I knew what they were saying was being corroborated by each other because I didn't want to get scammed. I also had mechanic anxiety and I was afraid that people were taking advantage of me because I didn't know anything. But I found one that I trusted. I got everything fixed with the van. So now the van is mechanically sound. And then I started working on the interior with my brother. And I started slow. We just rebuilt the bed and that made me very happy. For the first time in a long time I felt excited, giddy, all those feelings again. And then I started buying new decor. Seeing the van come together was also making me really happy. So I just kept going with it. And you can see right now just talking about things concerning my van like I'm starting to get happy. It just makes me happy. Every time I do something concerning the van I am happy. And this feeling is familiar. This is the same feeling I felt two years ago when I was very nervous like I am now. I was a little scared to invest a bunch of money in my van when I could be saving it for another vehicle. But because I have, I have these feelings of genuine joy I know I've just got to follow this feeling again. I'm saying it out loud. I love living in a vehicle. It doesn't even matter what kind. I just love it. And I'm also gonna say out loud I don't like living in traditional housing. I hate being in a house, an apartment, or a trailer. And I'm not sorry about it. I am not gonna force myself to try to live by society's standards of a normal person anymore. Ever again. I just can. And I don't know why my brain hates living like that but the fact of the matter is it just does. And living like this makes me happy. So that's what I'm gonna do. I don't want a white picket fence. I want off-road tires. I want an aluminum trowel so I can dig poop holes in the woods. I don't give a ---- about having a permanent address. And maybe one day I will. And that's okay. But not right now. So all of this is to say go towards what makes you happy. And if you're like me and you don't know exactly what that is, notice what you're doing when you have those small little moments of happiness. The way I did when I was working on my car or my van. And then just do more of those things. Indulge yourself in it. And don't pay attention to anyone that tells you what you're doing is wrong. If it genuinely makes you happy just do it. **** everyone else. Unless what makes you happy is beating people up. Then actually sign up for a boxing class because if you get good you can make a whole career out of But don't let anyone shame you. You should have seen the looks my friends gave me when I told them that I was moving into my car when I lived in LA. They were mortified. There's pretty much no place on earth where homelessness is cool. But if that place did exist, LA would be the complete opposite of that. People there love to flaunt wealth they don't have and live way above their means. So when I told people that I was moving into my car they were like, oh my god you're literally volunteering to be a homeless woman. I was like, yeah, yeah I am. And now I make a lot of money being homeless. Just kidding we're not there yet. Please subscribe and don't skip ads so one day we can get there. Anyway, do what you want to do because one day you're gonna be dead. Don't die with regrets. Love you. Bye guys.