05 — Vipassana
“Seeing things as they really are”.
A process of self-purification by self-observation.
What is Vipassana?
A technique that will eradicate suffering.
A method of mental purification that allows one to face life’s tensions and problems in a calm, balanced way.
An art of living that one can use to make positive contributions to society.
Vipassana, if practiced as prescribed, can eliminate all three causes of unhappiness: craving, aversion, and ignorance.
Why Vipassana?
It’s very hard to do. Make no mistakes about it… but it gets easier. As previously mentioned, I was suggested to look into Vipassana by a very close friend. Someone I trusted and understood what I was going through at that time. With zero mediation experience and little to no understanding (except what I read on their website) of the practice, I picked a dated and signed up. Of course, these 10-day courses get filled up immediately and I was placed on a waitlist. One of the questions they as you when you sign up is how much time you need if you are accepted into a course. I live in a van… so I said just two days’ notice.
While skiing at Brighton Resort in Utah, I got the email that I had been accepted to the 10-day course happening in Washington state, 2 days from then. So I dropped everything and drove 14 hours to Washington.
The 10 days
Upon arrival at the facility, you are required to go through a check-in, where you get your room assignments, and can unload your clothes for the 10 days. I had a little time to introduce myself to a few of the other participants and talk about our expectations, but pretty soon you’re sitting in their introduction hour and the “Noble Silence” starts.
The “Noble Silence” means silence of the body, speech, and mind. All students must observe this silence from the beginning of the course until the morning of the last full day.
After our introduction, it was settling in, going to sleep, and waiting for the 4:00 gong. Yes, your days are from 4:00 am - 9:30 pm every day, and it’s the exact same schedule every day. This is the schedule (you can find this on their website too):
4:00 am Morning wake-up bell
4:30 - 6:30 am Meditate in the hall or in your room
6:30 - 8:00 am Breakfast break
8:00 - 9:00 am Group meditation in the hall (mandatory)
9:00 - 11:00 am Meditate in the hall or in your room
11:00 - 12:00 noon Lunch break
12:00 - 1:00 pm Rest, and interviews with the teacher
1:00 - 2:30 pm Meditate in the hall or in your room
2:30 - 3:30 pm Group meditation in the hall (mandatory)
3:30 - 5:00 pm Meditate in the hall or in your room
5:00 - 6:00 pm Tea break
6:00 - 7:00 pm Group meditation in the hall (mandatory)
7:00 - 8:15 pm Teacher’s discourse in the hall
8:15 - 9:00 pm Group meditation in the hall (mandatory)
9:00 - 9:30 pm Questions in the hall
9:30 pm Retire to your room; lights out
This is what you’ll be doing for the 10 days you are at a Vipassana course. Any Vipassana course in the country will have this exact schedule. You will have the exact discourse teaching. You will be instructed the same at any location. This is one of the most interesting things about Vipassana is the teachings haven’t changed in thousands of years. Plus, they are free, always free. There’s no way for the teaching to be influenced or changed by investors or money. IT’S PURE.
Rather than going through each day… I want to give you the highlights as I experienced them and sometimes those were broader thoughts that happened over multiple days.
Day one through day four will be your hardest. It will be the hardest physically and mentally. It was physically the hardest thing that I had ever done in my life. Why? You think, how hard is it to sit and breathe? Try it, for 15 minutes. 30 minutes. And then think about the fact that I completed over 70 hours of meditation during my 10 days. It is difficult to sit and you will feel physical pain. But as you will learn as you continue during your experience, it’s part of the journey. During the first four days, you are just trying to get used to the schedule, and find a comfortable seated position to meditate and deal with your racing thoughts.
Upon advice from my friend, he suggested that I do my best to get up every day and meditate from 4:30-6:30. Which I did and I’m so glad I did. Now, the first three days were hard, and I didn’t sit comfortably for that entire time, but I did make an effort each morning. During these first days, your mind will race. I had all kinds of crazy throughs and very vivid dreams. Some were very dark and unusual. It’s all a part of the practice, and you’ll later understand why or have a better understanding of these thoughts.
Day four is when I started to feel a shift and where things changed for me. Specifically, the mandatory evening mediation from 6:00 - 7:00 pm. During this mediation, and from now on during your time here, they ask you to sit perfectly still. Try your best to have zero movements, but mainly to not open your eyes, or break your arm position, or your leg position. I was sitting, cross-legged style the past three days and through I was comfortable. That evening during the “still” meditation I breezed through the hour and felt amazing. I was very still and my mind and practice were great. Fast forward to the 8:00 am meditation the next morning and I was in excruciating pain from the second we sat down till 9:00 am. I did my best not to move but finished with tears in my eyes (this was one of three days that I cried during the 10 days). The next day I meditated in a seated chair, which is allowed if an injury or major pain affects your practice. What I learned was that when my knees were externally rotated, over time, they hurt. A LOT. So, I tried using a bench-style seat, where my knees were bent but were straight and I had no pain.
Day five through day seven is when I started to find a groove and begin to take in the meditation practice. I did cry on each one of these days. Day five because I was in pain. Days six and seven happened during our free time. I went to the center in Washington State and they had walking trails on the grounds that we were allowed to use during our free time. It was on these walks that memories, vivid thoughts, and realizations started to swell within me, and my emotions brought me to tears each of these days.
Days eight through ten is when I really started to feel and experience Vipassana. I didn’t ask my first questions to the teachers until day seven and when I did, I was able to get clarity on things I didn’t understand. But it took me a few days to understand what I was thinking and feeling in order to ask the right questions for me. And this is when I found myself wanting to go meditate. In the first three days, the times that are optional or when you’re allowed to meditate in your room, you might find yourself crawling back into bed, or lying in bed thinking. Honestly, I did. Yet, in the last half of the 10 days, I started to desire to meditate and to work at the practice of Vipassana. For the last three days, I averaged 8-10 hours of meditation each day.
The discourses
The discourses are the teachings each evening. These are recordings of S.N. Goenka teaching a course in 1991. These are what you’ll see at any 10-day course in the US. The teaching is consistent and it is amazing based on his many years of teaching, and how accurate he was. What do I mean? After each day, from 7:00 - 8:15 pm, you watch these recordings. During the day, you have so many thoughts and wonder what you’re doing. Almost every evening, as I watched these, it was as if he was reading my mind. He would explain exactly why and what I was feeling and how Vipassana will affect me if I continue to work at the practice. This blew my mind, and at the end of the course, I was surprised to learn that almost every participant had a similar experience. These discourses are where you will learn the understanding of Vipassana and how it will help you in your life. Everyone is different and has different expectations for mediation in their lives, but Vipassana is based on reality, breathing, and physical sensations. All things you can understand very easily and apply to your life.
I don’t want to go into the specifics of the meditation practice. I’m sure you can search that out online, but rather, I want you to read this and be curious and just go. You won’t regret it. I had zero meditation experience, completed all ten days, and this has changed my life.
You won’t come out right away and practice twice a day like they want you to. I was realistic to understand that, but I continued to meditate for one hour when I do. Is this every day, not yet, but I’m getting closer to that and I often find myself closing my eyes and coming back to my breath throughout my days for a brief moment. At the end of the day, you control how much effort you want to put into this, but what is proven, is that if you do, it will help you. There’s no doubt about that, therefore I’m working very hard to make this a part of my everyday life. During my last few days there, my questions were all based on this; how do I make this a part of my everyday life? The teacher told me a lot of great stories relating to his personal practice and wanted me to be patient and allow myself some grace when I don’t practice. He reminded me that the Vipassana would always be there and the more I practiced, the better things would be, but not to be disappointed or hard on myself for missing.
Final reactions
Just go! Seriously, if you have any type of anxiety or stress (among many other things), it will help immediately. It’s very hard, and you have to work at it, and the 10 days are not easy, but if you complete the course, you will be far better off than you were 10 days prior. It’s can be life-changing. It has opened my eyes to so much inside of me and I know as I continue to practice, this will change my life.
I wish you all peace and harmony in your future experience with Vipassana.
04 — Geotagging
Back from Japan and hanging out with some friends in the desert before we head back up to the mountains to ski. Yes, I’m working on the Japan YouTube edits and a Japan blog post, but they will take some time… so in the short term, I’m going to post some more content. The topic on this day, which was a hike with Christine Reed (@ruggedoutdoorswoman) was geotagging. We completed a 12.5 loop of some of the most beautiful trails in the Phoenix, Arizona area. This hike lead us to a very popular destination in the Superstition Mountain area, which you’ll probably be able to guess based on the images below. If you can’t figure it out… watch the YouTube video below!
What is geotagging? It’s assigning a digital tag to a photo, video, or post on social media or on any digital publication. A digital tag usually includes some type of location information and/or GPS coordinates of that location.
We discuss the ideas of geotagging in many areas including photography, hiking, camping, and van life. It’s a great discussion throughout our hike in Arizona, and we come to a conclusion that may surprise you. I won’t share our conclusion in my blog post, but have you watched our conversation on YouTube? Click here (YouTube.com/@beardedvanlife)
Definitely watch the episode! There are a few additional articles in the show notes and a link to buy Christine’s amazing book “Along in Wonderland.” You can also CLICK HERE to buy her book!
03 — Ski Utah
Read about our winter adventures in Utah!
After spending a lot of time in Colorado, it was time to get to Utah! Unfortunately, I missed all the most epic snow in this area as it fell early in December, but nonetheless, we made it.
Utah is slowly becoming a second home for me. Not only because I purchased a property here and lived in Park City for a season, but it’s simply magical.
Upon arriving in Utah, Park City specifically, the first order of business is always to check in at the Park City Yotel. This is where my rental property is located. It is an amazing property, in an amazing location, and is always available to rent! This is the link to more information and where you can book your reservation — www.parkcityyotelpad.com
Act fast as they are filling up, but book your spring skiing reservations now or think ahead for your summer adventures now!
The second day in town it was nuking snow and my buddy Damon and I decided to avoid the crowds and hit the backcountry gate at Park City Canyons. It was heavy, deep snow conditions but, wow, it was worth the walk up the ridge. Entering the backcountry gate behind the patrol shack on Peak 5, you skin up the ridge between Peak 5 and 9990, then drop in the backside. 24-30” of fresh snow, completely untracked. Could not have asked for better conditions. I’ve made a few IG REELS based on these two runs, definitely worth checking out — Instagram.com/beardedvanlife What we didn’t anticipate was that it has snowed so much that the normally reliable skin track back to the summit was completely gone. We worked very hard on that first walk back up the hill. A few runs later and it was time to call it a day, and what a day it was!
Next, we met up with Lindsey — Instagram.com/girlgoneglamping and her crew at Solitude. A bluebird day, good snow, and a fellow nomad who rips on skis. What more could you ask for? We spent the morning making quick runs, the afternoon doing a quick mountain photoshoot, and ended the day with runs with her crew. So glad I was able to meet up with Lindsey (we had been coordinating schedules for a bit prior) on this day and she’ll definitely be someone we’ll ski with and hang with in the future.
Lastly, we met up with the ultimate van life connector, Kayden Phan. Miss Storyteller herself, definitely check out her — Instagram.com/kaydenphan We skied together on a few occasions this trip. A great, snowy day in Deer Valley where we boosted her confidence in the bumps and trees. A bluebird day at Brighton where we got her on some steep, double black diamonds. And finally, back at Brighton where we met up with a bunch of other van lifers and through a little party in the parking lot at the base of Brighton.
This was a great few weeks in Utah and in the winter, we ski in Utah. It seems that as I’ve started with my goal of shooting more videos for 2023, these blog posts are running in line with the content I’m shooting for YouTube.com/@beardedvanlife Go check out the latest vlog about the above adventures in Utah!
Almost forgot… got the Defender out for a quick drive and did a little photoshoot with her big sister, Althea :)
Now we are getting ready for an adventure I’ve been waiting my entire life to take… skiing in Japan!
02 — 2023, a new year!
Goals for 2023!
2023 has begun… new beginnings, a fresh outlook, and new goals. This New Year started off with a few fresh tattoos and some hard work on a friend’s van renovation in Dallas. I’m a designer. Never in a million years did I think that I would build something in a van, but I am proud of the work I did. I’ve realized I’m capable of building out a van if that crosses my path in the future.
Left Texas and headed toward Colorado. In the Rocky Mountain state, we made a visit to Rossmonster Van’s and got some things fixed and upgraded on Althea. Some minor interior repairs, and a major internet upgrade! Installed the new permanent, “in-motion,” StarLink. All I can say is, “wow!” Definitely more to come on that in a future post.
Took a few days to kick off the ski season for Althea and me. A little late, but “had to go see about a girl.” Ripped Cooper Mountain with my ski patroller cousin, got to see my very good friend Emily learn to ski, and had a few incredible days at Steamboat Springs. Then off to a client photoshoot on the Western Slope.
While shooting for my client, she had to fly to LA and needed someone to watch her ranch. She has one great dog, two cats that think they are dogs, and three ducks. S0 I got a chance to slow down for a few days on the ranch. I took care of the animals, focused on some editing, backcountry skied every day, and thought about my goals for this year.
I’ve been shooting photography as a professional for over three years now. I love it. I’m getting better with each frame taken and always making sure my clients are completely satisfied with their assets. But the world is moving fast and video is the new frontier. Actually, it has been for years, but making video content is becoming more and more relevant and that is my goal for 2023. I want to learn, improve, and shoot more video content. With the launch of my YouTube show “Life on the Road” I took that first step. I don’t know if it’s good. I have no idea if it will be successful. Yet, I took a step, created something from nothing, and put it out into the world. Definitely go check it out! Like and subscribe… YouTube - Life on the Road
What are your goals for 2023?
Expect to see more video content from me in the near future. I’m enjoying the process and learning along the way, so we’ll see what happens. At this point, it’s about having fun and not caring what others think. I’m always trying to focus on doing the things that make me happy, and if I keep doing those things… it will all work out.
From the Western slope of Colorado, we set out for Utah…
01— 25,000 miles in the first 6 months of Vanlife
The first 6 months of — Life on the Road
First night sleeping in the van!
On May 1, 2022, we started this van life journey at the shop of my van builder, Rossmonster, in Longmont, Colorado. Six months later, on the day, we rolled into the parking lot of A-Basin to ski. Exactly 25,000 miles later, it has been a crazy, fun summer of adventures, and Althea and I can’t wait for the next 6 months!
Turning 25K on the exact day of my 6th-month vananniversary! Pulled into the parking lot of A-Bain… a perfect spot to celebrate!
Those 25k miles have taken us to the Pacific Ocean on three separate occasions and back to Denver on three separate occasions. Along with Wisconsin, South Dakota, New Mexico, Arizona, Utah, Wyoming, Idaho, Montana, Washington, Oregon, and California. Needless to say, we’ve done a bit of driving.
This is my first blog post on beardedvanlife.com and my hope is to post weekly to be able to bring updates on all our adventures. These are meant to be short, fun, and full of images highlighting our travels.
As I’m not going to share, document, or write about all our adventures over the last six months… but some of the biggest highlights have been: biking in Crested Butte, Park City (always), 4 incredible Grateful Dead shows, family lake trip in Wisconsin, Montana, our first van meet up at Open Roads, Descend on Bend, and then Moon Landing. But the biggest highlight has been the community. The van life community will be a coming post, but to be welcomed into this community and to have made the friends I’ve made this summer has been the absolute best! To all my friends who I’ve met on the road, thank you and I can’t wait to see you all soon. To all those on the road whom I haven’t crossed paths with… I look forward to meeting you! And to those considering van life, please reach out with questions and we hope to see you all soon!
