I came across Mark Manson not so long ago when I first picked up his book – the only English book available on a long aisle full of Vietnamese ones. Fast forward to today, stumbling upon his personal blog felt like I had discovered a new treasure: things in the past, lack out of trend, but still golden and gorgeous. I couldn’t really skim through anything, since everything worth more than a dime of attention. I read an article head to toes, reflected on it, and wrote my thoughts out loud just for now.
Who doesn’t dream to be a digital nomad? The high life of traveling the world, being in places full of sunshine and fancy street arts, working whenever you can and earn remarkable wealth on the way. Like many thrilled Millennials, I used to love the high and low of moving around so much. My lifestyle also just happened to be carried on the same way although my source of income is nowhere near the 6-figures bracket of uprising New Rich. Regardless, whatever Mark Manson said in the article, it reflected my core struggle.
“Because the price of overwhelming freedom is often my isolation.”
This hits hard. Like not a bullet going through skin into the deep end of our heart. It was more like someone squeezed it a bit and released it in the fraction of a second. It’s like realizing a painful truth, but since you are grateful for the truth you are ok with the pain that comes with it.
I love freedom. I wasn’t in the despair of war and conflict, but I value freedom like it’s everything I have. Yet freedom comes with isolation, or detachment of external intact. You are not bonded to anything closer than yourself, which let you move freely without much guilt of non-presence. Yet, it leads you to a road that you are the only one who can be 24/7 available for you. Although you are interconnected to a global network of thousands or millions of people, but like Mark said, “We can relate on a deeply experiential level. In a lifestyle where none of our friends or families back home can comprehend what our day-to-day is like, these loose global networks exist for us to keep each other sane. Yet, for our philosophical connections, we lack that emotional depth and bond that comes with shared struggle and life’s important moments. Mainly because there are few struggles and when the important moments happen, we’re always somewhere else.”
It’s crazy to think that with 400k+ followers and millions of readers around the world gathering their minds at his pages, Mark Manson is still somehow suffering loneliness. And many others too. Some that Mark mentioned within his circle. Some that I know personally. Some are friends, colleagues, and people who I care for the most. Yet we all have to accept that level of independence, as a trade-in for something more meaningful, something greater that lies within our core values and happiness: our needs for gaining experiences and exploring the world.
Mark Manson had shared so much of his life views that I found indispensable. I need time to process all of them, be selective and put them into action. For now, I want to keep reading. I want to write back. I want to act to improve myself even more. I promised myself that I will be sleeping at 12 AM but I have already missed my deadline. Everything, I realized, have a trade-off, and opportunity cost will be involved regardless.
Oops.
Still reading and counting pages anyway.
Qbooz 