Just turned thirty, and man, so grateful for where I’m at. All these gifts I’ve been given, just being able to live my life in this way. But still there is this pressure that I’ve got to figure shit out.

I’ve been hard on myself.

I cried last week with one of my best friends, Greg. Crying with a friend is often the release of pressure I need. It’s often hard to cry alone. But once I talk with one of my best friends, the tears start flowing.

If you feel like you need a good cry, call a friend. Give them the gift of helping you cry. Highly recommend it.

I have a fear that I don’t know where I’m going.

What does that mean? That I’m scared.

One day, I want to have a family, and I want to be able to provide for them and give them the life that I had as a kid. I’m scared of not being able to do that.

I’m scared that I’m not going to be able to live life in the way that I want to live.

Because I think I know what I love, and that’s writing, writing books specifically. I want to be able to do it freely for the rest of my life.

How do I get to that place that I imagine?

Well one thing’s for sure: It’s not supposed to be easy. If it were, we wouldn’t want it anyway. If it were easy, everybody would be living the life of their dreams.

But it’s sort of an anomaly, one that’s undoubtedly worth fighting to be.

Anything worth achieving takes time, dedication, patience, tears, will, and friendships to help us through the darker days.

I’m just grateful for my friends, because when all else fails, when I’m just down on myself, or I’m scared, or I don’t know which way to turn — I can turn to them.

I know I’m not alone, that they’re feeling the same things I am, and that we’re all scared, and that’s okay. We’re all figuring things out in our own ways, this puzzle of life, trying to fit together the pieces of our journey; trying to make them fit in a way that we can understand.

I spent my thirtieth birthday with my girlfriend in New Hampshire at her family’s cabin on this lake. It was freaking beautiful.

I’d get up in the morning and go for a long swim or paddle board. And then I’d write. I’ve started writing my third book, based on my experiences in Japan teaching English. It felt really good to get that project going, because writing books is what I love more than anything.

This next one is going to be fiction, and I have a feeling that it’s going to be extremely special for me. They say write what you know — so the book is based on my actual experiences and my story in life, but with a mystical tinge, a spiritual essence, and a lotta imagination. Yet I can imbue the story with the lessons I learned in Japan, and damn, I learned a lot over there.

In Japan, I started to truly understand myself and my emotions, and that came from difficulties in relationships, and pain in my body. It’s all gonna be in the book, and I’m psyched.

It’s been so cool looking back on the stories I’ve written from my time in Japan, as I’m using them to guide the timeline of the book. It’s made me realize something:

If you were in Japan with me, it can feel like our time in Japan was a beginning and an end —a chapter that opened and closed. We went, had our fun, and now, most of us are back home.

But the way I see it, and what I’ve been feeling lately, is that Japan will always be a significant part of our lives. It was just the beginning of seeing the world in a very different way, and that is something that flying back home can’t change.

The chapter’s opened, and it’s our duty to keep writing the story.

Now, I now have this job in Oakland at a coffee shop, where I’m learning a new skill set, meeting people, and feeling like I’m part of the community. I needed this. Something I don’t always wanna do, but that is good for me — work.

Learning.

Growth.

It feels good.

Recently I’ve written about how my dream is to work for a magazine or online publication so I can get the professional experience I’ve felt like I’m lacking. Before that, my goal was to build my own business online as a freelance writer, making money from these stories.

But it just hasn’t felt like me.

We’re pivoting again.

I can try in the future to make these things work, but for now, I need to simplify. I’m just tired of trying to keep up; tired of trying to achieve. I’m sick of the comparison of writing online, never feeling like I’m good enough, or that I’m doing something wrong.

I’m tired of feeling like I need to feed the machine. Weighed down by my own deadlines, all these things I think I have to do.

I just want to focus on my book.

Take a break from the rest. That means this newsletter will be less frequent, and so will the podcast. I don’t want there to be a weekly deadline. Rather, I want to write stories when I have something I wanna say, and speak from the heart when I feel it’s right.

So that’s what I’m gonna do.

I want a life of peace, inspiration, joy, creativity. We can’t do everything, and I’m done being hard on myself, fighting myself, stealing my own peace.

I had this realization out there on the lake that the life I want is the life I’m living, writing books and just appreciating the world around me.

I’m exactly where I’m meant to be. There’s no need for the added pressure.

I have faith that if I keep going, maybe when in my 40s, 50s, I’ll have that life where I’m getting paid to write books, and I can just spend time with my family and the people I love.

A beautiful, simple life.

It’ll take time to get to that place. I’m not going to waste it in fear or worry, because when I’m there, I’m sure I’d give anything simply to feel thirty again.

So I’ll dance now, while the music’s still playin’.

There isn’t somewhere we have to try to go.

We’re going somewhere, and that’s to the next moment, and the next, and the next.

We’re on the journey, the adventure of a lifetime. Each day is just a drop in the ocean. But that drop is all there is. Focus on the day, your mindset, and life will take care of itself.

When thinking about the big picture, we all have our underlying fears, but life is lived day to day, and day by day, I’m going to enjoy whatever I get to do.

Anything we do is just an experience.

That’s it.

It’s logical to see life as linear, with time only moving forward in one direction, and our path either progressing or not.

But I don’t see it that way. Life trends, it flows, it’s constantly in flux. Life often happens not at all, then all at once. I feel like I’m a student, building a foundation in understanding myself and the world. I’m learning how to dance with the flux.

Life is good. It’s beautiful, constantly trying to unfold.

I won’t fight it.

I’m here for it. Here to let it unfold in the way it’s meant to.