Jump off the Hamster Wheel!

Running around every day like I’m headed someplace important, someplace that I’m late getting to, someplace where someone may die if I’m not there. Working 40-60 hours each week so that I can make for sure my family has everything that they absolutely need, you know, the essentials like internet, cable, cell phones, dinner out a few times a week, new football gear, gym memberships, every opportunity to do each and every activity possible…. need I go on? This crazy race to arrive at the same place we all eventually end up… why?

Why? I think that’s a question most of us will ask at some point in our life. The problem is that we are mostly too scared to verbalize these thoughts or questions. If you have, you were probably met with that “you’re a fanatic weirdo” stare.

What am I supposed to do? How can I live a fulfilling life without all the above mentioned necessities? How will my kids be able to cope without having all the opportunities that all the Jones’ have? How will they ever survive?

Here’s the Truth of the matter…. Take away the video games and electronics and watch the magic happen (after the initial meltdown passes). It was amazing how the imagination of my 4, 7, and 8 year old began to take off. They were all of a sudden building forts with blankets and chairs, and hiding in cardboard boxes to play hide and seek. Out in the garage, they were building castles with all the scrap wood I have piled up. True Magic!

I took it a step further…. “Let’s plant some vegetables, kids!” I thought I was going to have a heart attack when my oldest said that he loved planting seeds and growing a garden. My 4 yo little girl and I check on the vegetables every morning and she is usually the one reminding me to go water so they don’t die in this Las Vegas Heat.

It’s been a month without electronics…. We still watch TV but absolutely no video games or watching videos where kids are playing the games and posting them on-line. I have found myself having intelligent conversations about life and not what my favorite Roblox character is.

What do I do with all this new information, with these new thoughts, with these new ideas about what life could look like if we weren’t so bogged down with all the meaningless nonsense? How can I find a way to spend more time at home? How can we find a way to move away from the city and live a more peaceful and more purposeful life?

I have no idea! Then I met another parent of one of the kids on our boy’s football team who makes his living day trading cryptocurrencies. Huh? What in the world is that? Crypto’s, Bitcoin, alt-coin’s, blockchain, decentralized monetary system, again, Huh?

So I began to study, began to teach myself (with a little help from my new found friend) what all this gibberish meant. I still have a long way to go.

Nevertheless, I jumped in. It’s been kind of crazy, the volatility can be frightening but I may have found the answer to my question. I may, in fact, have found the way to live the life I long for, a life I’m sure my family will eventually be thankful for.

This is who I am.
This is where I am at.