Dark Matter, Your Future Self, and Finding the Motivation to Write Without an Audience, Advance, or Deadline. — A few weeks back I was taking my pup, Rue Billy, on our daily sunset jog. That evening I happened to be listening to a Podcast that I was just turned on to by a friend. …

The original text is in bold, followed by an extended explanation. — Many of my favorite stoned or random thoughts made it into my first book, a memoir about my first four years of solo backpacking across four continents. For the past five years—no matter where I was in the world—if I had a fresh idea, new realization, or clever phrasing pop…

A Story from One Saturday Afternoon On the Coast of Oaxaca — This past Saturday I was working under the afternoon sun in my favorite place, El Puerecito, 30 minutes east on the coastal highway from my home in Puerto Escondido. For some reason, something felt a little off. Not wrong, just incomplete. I was sweaty and dirty but still slightly restless…

The 10 Best Books I’ve Read Over the Past Two Years — I read on my kindle every single day. I rent ebooks to my kindle from a library back in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, where I grew up. If you don’t know this hack, I explain how it works and how much it’s saved over the past ten years of traveling and living…

You don’t know what you don’t know, and I didn’t know these four things before first leaving The States over a decade ago. — I remember what it was like. I remember the swirling worry and anxiety before my first big, unplanned, open-ended, international adventure. I flew into Aruba, a small island just above Colombia’s northern coast, without even having a bed booked for that first night. I leaned into serendipity and started to…

I Don’t Love Every Memoir I Read, But These Six (Well, Seven) Are Undeniably Special — You don’t have to read them. You don’t have to read this—you can do whatever you want—you’re an adult! Go get some ice cream! But, if you’re a book lover, I highly recommend these six recent memoirs below. They all achieve the goal of bringing you behind the curtain to…

Note before we get started: I’m going to call folks from the States “Americans” in this piece for the sake of clarity, but I explain here why I think the term is pretty dumb. If the Spanish language can have a word for “person from the United States” (Estadounidense) I…

My long, wordy journey to earning $2,000 on Medium — I cringe every time I see a successful (or not) Medium writer give this “publish as often as possible” advice to other writers about how to succeed on Medium. If you read about the platform itself you’ll find this guidance a lot. …

It might be why you do too, but you just never stopped to think about it — It’s the middle of the World Cup. It’s the middle of the NFL season. It’s the start of both the NHL and NBA seasons. College football and basketball are in full swing. There are big fight nights most weekends. Right now is an absolutely incredible time for sports fans. …