Australia Entry #9 - September 1st - September 23rd, 2024

Where Does the Time Go?

It’s now been more than five months that I’ve spent in Australia and I constantly look back thinking where did the time go? I think part of it might just be that I’m most at home trying to optimize the situations I’m in. Give me a situation with some fixed restraints and I find myself enjoying the time trying to piece together where to best spend my time and energy. However, I think as much as that kind of skill has been a blessing in my work life, on days where I let my mind wander and thing (especially during late night walks that I enjoy doing) I find myself second guessing whether I’m just living in a period of time where I am trying to check off all the checkboxes or whether when I look back at this point in life I have long lasting memories of my time in Australia. I’ve noticed that throughout my early adulthood the memories that stick with me are the ones where I push myself past the point of doing something smart and take a leap of faith into trying something new and original. A few months into owning a car I went on a weekend trip north in Wisconsin to Door County and slept in my car under three blankets. I went hiking and stayed into the pitch darkness in New Zealand. I pushed myself past my comfort zone and organized some trips in China beyond those that the summer internship company set up. These kind of memories have stuck with me because it was a moment where I could have easily chosen a simpler path or made my life easier, but then I would not have learned or experienced things in the same way. Sure, I could have bought a hotel or come back in the morning, or hired a guide to still do the same experiences that I did, but doing them the way I did let me enjoy them that much more.

I say this because if you have been reading along through all my posts I may have kept you busy with all the hiking and tv shows and movies and video games that I’ve been listing off, but many, to me, have not had the effect of something that would stick in my mind as a core memory of my time in Australia. The last few weeks though, I experienced a hike that pushed me to new limits and helped put into perspective what I could do. I won’t babble on too much on the hike, but I have linked a video below and some images in for you to take a look at. At points, we went off trail and walked along the ridgeline carving our own path and figuring out the best way to get from point A to point B. At one point I froze up as there was a small rock climb down off a ledge and it was the only way to complete the loop, but I’m happy to have safely pushed myself beyond what I had ever done before. I’d been talking a lot about some of the adventures or trips that I wanted to do for myself, but honestly it’s been a bit of a crutch to fall back on the hiking group helping get me from one hike to the next. There is something that I’m missing through that you really only get to experience if you go hiking by yourself. Enjoying endless nature all around you with no other person in sight.

Why Am I Holding Myself Back?

Today I watched a youtube video by Drew Gooden titled “Everybody wants to waste your time” and it really struck a cord with the way things have been going for me for the last few months, replacing Everybody with my own choices. Near the end of the video I’ll quote the lines that really resonated with the ways I had been doing things myself over the last few months. I tracked movies and video games in a list on excel and was always watching to mark things off the list itself than to do it sometimes for my own pleasure.

“The way our attention gets pulled in every direction at all times also makes me feel like I should be multitasking always, or I’ll fall behind. I always feel like I’m missing out on something. There’s so many movies I want to watch and games I want to play, and there’s not enough hours in the day to do it all. So when I do get myself some free time I try to be overly efficient with it. I can’t just play a video game, I should be catching up on podcasts. Loading screen, perfect that gives me exactly nine seconds to scroll through social media. I’d hate to be bored”

I’ve realized that by forcing myself down this hyper efficient road of doing as much as I can in the little time I may or may not have in Australia is causing weeks to blur and having me fall into some bad habits. Work at Epic has always been a kind of mental drain at the end of the day and I’ve mentioned in some previous posts that some of my push into watching more movies and tv shows stemmed from coming back from work and not even having the energy to want to hold a controller and give any input to a narrative video game story. I unfortunately don’t think that will go away anytime soon, but it has stopped me from pursuing some of the more artist endeavors that I hold somewhere in the back of my mind. I always wanted to play piano, I always wanted to get better at woodworking and carving and whittling. I always wanted to get more flexible and exercise and cook healthy and take care of my body, but as I find more and more things that are interesting to me, the less time I can devote to one thing and truly sink my teeth into it and get good at it.

It’s Time I Learn to Spend?

Growing up, a lot of my hobbies tended to be on the cheaper end of things. I got big into video games because for a big upfront cost of buying a computer and a console, the things you could do with it or the bargain games you can get for it where limitless. When I was still in no more than upper elementary school my parents bought me a computer for Christmas and I stuck to using that same computer, a Windows XP, until I needed to get a laptop for college. I missed out on the whole PS3 and Xbox 360 generation of games and instead got big into them by going over friends houses and spending the time to play those games together with them. Realistically, I got big into hiking because it was one of the cheaper or free things to do once you sorted transportation.

I went to the movies today for the first time in a very long time. The last movie I remember seeing was Avatar the Way of Water back in December of 2022, and yet I enjoyed both of my experiences immensely. I remember working night shifts in Indiana before Epic and going to see Spiderman No Way Home and having a total blast, and yet there’s always something in the back of my mind nagging me about spending the money to go out and experience it in a huge theater because I know it’ll be free in a few months on some websites. I started watching Ramit Sethi on youtube because it’s honestly been a struggle to adjust my mind to being okay with spending. The optimizing part of my brain wants to keep saving and saving and min/maxing the opportunities I have, but deep down I know that I’m just ruining it for myself. Why do I get in these situations where I know I am doing something I want to be doing, but purposely ruining the experience for the sake of making sure I don’t make a mistake.

I want to change the approach that I’ve been taking in situations to force myself to think less and just go with the flow and enjoy the moment or enjoy the pain of the moment. Why have I not been to a bookstore or a coffee shop yet in Melbourne? I know that there are certain books I want to read and there are certain atmospheres where owning a physical copy would make me enjoy it way more than a free ebook or audiobook that I force myself to power through when I’m not in the mood solely because it feels like “I haven’t read in a while”. I also know reading the book when at the beach or in nature would elevate my experience and yet I pause and contemplate whether it’s worth the effort to buy a $5 metro ticket to get to that nicer location. It’s stupid, it’s insane, it’s unhealthy, and yet I can’t stop my mind from going down these rabbit holes of optimizing the fun and spontenuity of out things. The hike I went on this last week was fun and crazy and memorable because I forced myself to not look into it and I was pleasantly surprised by the unexpected fun and challenges I had.

So here’s the deal. I’m being dumb and dragging this on for too long. I need to call the Enterprise car rental agency downtime to see if I can rent a car with a P2 (probationary) driver’s license while in Australia. I need to leave work a little early to talk with my apartment complex manager to see how my parking spot works and if I could leave the car there overnight to make it easier to go somewhere over the weekend. And finally I need to pack my hiking bag with my foldable chair, a blanket, and my phone and hike over to the Hanging Rocks to hang out and enjoy the nicer weather we are starting to have. And I woke pack a lunch, to force myself to instead buy it at the cafe over there because for peethe sake I deserve not having to think about making food when there is delicious stuff near there for $20. I have until the end of the week to go to the Hanging Rocks for the extended weekend and if I can book a car with my current drivers license I am pre-booking something before I fly out to Singapore for my DR cutover trip. These are the tasks that have been lingering in the back of my mind for a few weeks now and I really need to just take it head on or I’ll keep finding the time slowly ticking away and finding that I have limited options to do the things I want to do.

If I can figure out the car, then I can do weekend flights to other places in Australia and explore some more and I can book a hike for the Three Capes Trail in Tasmania for next year.

A Few Extra Notes

That being said, I’ve also been playing a lot of Cyberpunk recently and I have been enjoying it a lot, but it’s starting to feel like I am forcing my way through my video game backlog and I don’t want to burn myself out before hitting some of the other games that I am insanely looking forward to (Red Dead Redemption 2, Baldur’s Gate 3). I just need to rewire my brain to not always think about the min/max and to sometimes live in the moment. Knowing myself, though, it’s perfectly fine if I have to force those moments to happen because I give myself no other options.

In case you were curious, I went to see The Wild Robot in theaters and do recommend it for those that want a feel-good wholesome watch. The paintbrush style art was also splendidly crafted and really popped on the screen. Honestly, it’s worth watching just for the visuals.

Images and Videos

Link here