 | |  | |  |
| Cheap Green RV Living |
 | |  | |  | |  | |  |
| This website takes no responsibility for dangers you may encounter by following our advice See disclaimer |
Finding True
Freedom
Freedom
Visit our sister site: cheaprvliving.com
Join our Forum: cheaprvlivingforum.com
Join our Forum: cheaprvlivingforum.com
Consider giving a small
donation to support this site
donation to support this site
Finding the joy in Green Living.
| The Earth Does Not Belong to Us, We Belong To The Earth. ~ Chief Seattle |
"This is something I have thought about for a long time. It's about white people and why
they don't understand us.... I think it's because the most important thing for white people is
freedom. The most important thing for Indian people is honor.... But the Indian has always
been free. We are free today. We have always been freer than the white man, even when he
first came here....
"The white world puts all the power at the top.... When someone gets to the top, they have
the power to take your freedom. When your people first came to our land, they were trying to
get away from those people at the top. But they still thought the same way, and soon there
were new people at the top in the new country....
"In your churches there is someone at the top. In your schools, too. In your business. There
is always someone at the top, and that person has the right to say whether you are
good or bad. They own you.
"No wonder Americans always worry about freedom. You have so damn little of it. If you
don't protect it, someone will take it away from you. You have to guard it every second, like a
dog guards a bone....
"When you came among us, you couldn't understand our way. You wanted to find the
person at the top. You wanted to find the fences that bound us in--how far our land went, how
far our government went. Your world was made of cages, you believed in them. They defined
your world, and you needed them to define ours.
"Our old people noticed this from the beginning. They said the white man lived in a world of
cages, and that if we didn't look out, they would make us live in a world of cages, too.
"So we started noticing. Everything looked like cages. Your clothes fit like cages. Your
houses looked like cages. You put fences around your yards so they looked like
cages too. Everything was a cage. You turned the land into cages, little squares.
"Then after you had all these cages, you made a government to protect the cages. And that
government was all cages. All laws about what you couldn't do. The only freedom you had
was inside your own cage. Then you wondered why you weren't happy and didn't
feel free. You made all the cages, then you wondered why you didn't feel free.
they don't understand us.... I think it's because the most important thing for white people is
freedom. The most important thing for Indian people is honor.... But the Indian has always
been free. We are free today. We have always been freer than the white man, even when he
first came here....
"The white world puts all the power at the top.... When someone gets to the top, they have
the power to take your freedom. When your people first came to our land, they were trying to
get away from those people at the top. But they still thought the same way, and soon there
were new people at the top in the new country....
"In your churches there is someone at the top. In your schools, too. In your business. There
is always someone at the top, and that person has the right to say whether you are
good or bad. They own you.
"No wonder Americans always worry about freedom. You have so damn little of it. If you
don't protect it, someone will take it away from you. You have to guard it every second, like a
dog guards a bone....
"When you came among us, you couldn't understand our way. You wanted to find the
person at the top. You wanted to find the fences that bound us in--how far our land went, how
far our government went. Your world was made of cages, you believed in them. They defined
your world, and you needed them to define ours.
"Our old people noticed this from the beginning. They said the white man lived in a world of
cages, and that if we didn't look out, they would make us live in a world of cages, too.
"So we started noticing. Everything looked like cages. Your clothes fit like cages. Your
houses looked like cages. You put fences around your yards so they looked like
cages too. Everything was a cage. You turned the land into cages, little squares.
"Then after you had all these cages, you made a government to protect the cages. And that
government was all cages. All laws about what you couldn't do. The only freedom you had
was inside your own cage. Then you wondered why you weren't happy and didn't
feel free. You made all the cages, then you wondered why you didn't feel free.
Whenever I tell someone that I live full-time in my little camper, there first reaction is
amazement that anyone can live in such a small and basic space. The majority of the time, their
next reaction is negative. Either they are baffled that anyone would do something so foolish, or
outright rejection of something bordering on insanity. Every so often, the reaction will be
positive, and I can tell that something in them is responding with an identification and longing
for what I have. Inevitably, the person will ask me why I choose to live this way. For me the
answer can be put into one word: freedom. I have found a freedom in living that brings me
great joy and happiness. I've often tried to put it into words exactly what I mean by freedom,
and more importantly freedom from what. I don't think I have ever really done it justice. I can
tell you what I don't mean. I don't mean any kind of political freedom in the sense of civil
liberties. No, it is much deeper and profound than that. Something deeper in the nature of who
I am and my relationship with society as a whole. Recently, I found it stated perfectly in a
book I was reading, and I want to share that with you. This is a quote from the book, "Neither
Wolf Nor Dog" by Kent Nerburn, published by New World Library pages 155-157 (see box at right). I
know it's a long quote, but if you will take the time to read the whole thing, I believe you will be
moved just as I was. I added the emphasis.
amazement that anyone can live in such a small and basic space. The majority of the time, their
next reaction is negative. Either they are baffled that anyone would do something so foolish, or
outright rejection of something bordering on insanity. Every so often, the reaction will be
positive, and I can tell that something in them is responding with an identification and longing
for what I have. Inevitably, the person will ask me why I choose to live this way. For me the
answer can be put into one word: freedom. I have found a freedom in living that brings me
great joy and happiness. I've often tried to put it into words exactly what I mean by freedom,
and more importantly freedom from what. I don't think I have ever really done it justice. I can
tell you what I don't mean. I don't mean any kind of political freedom in the sense of civil
liberties. No, it is much deeper and profound than that. Something deeper in the nature of who
I am and my relationship with society as a whole. Recently, I found it stated perfectly in a
book I was reading, and I want to share that with you. This is a quote from the book, "Neither
Wolf Nor Dog" by Kent Nerburn, published by New World Library pages 155-157 (see box at right). I
know it's a long quote, but if you will take the time to read the whole thing, I believe you will be
moved just as I was. I added the emphasis.
"Neither Wolf Nor Dog" by Kent
Nerburn, published by New World
Library
If you have any interest in learning about
Native American life, this is the first book
you should buy. Instead of a white man
writing about Native Americans, it is an
Indian speaking about his people, and put
into book-form by an outstanding white
author. The result is very enlightening,
readable, and extremely moving. The
author, Kent Nerburn, had written several
well-received books on Native American
life. Dan, a Native American elder living on
a Reservation in the Dakotas had read
them and invited him to come and stay with
him and write his thoughts into book form.
Nerburn accepted and stayed with Dan
and learned from him. He recorded his
thoughts and this book is the result. There
are deep, life-changing truths here for
anyone open to hear them. Very highly
recommended. ***** 5 Stars
Nerburn, published by New World
Library
If you have any interest in learning about
Native American life, this is the first book
you should buy. Instead of a white man
writing about Native Americans, it is an
Indian speaking about his people, and put
into book-form by an outstanding white
author. The result is very enlightening,
readable, and extremely moving. The
author, Kent Nerburn, had written several
well-received books on Native American
life. Dan, a Native American elder living on
a Reservation in the Dakotas had read
them and invited him to come and stay with
him and write his thoughts into book form.
Nerburn accepted and stayed with Dan
and learned from him. He recorded his
thoughts and this book is the result. There
are deep, life-changing truths here for
anyone open to hear them. Very highly
recommended. ***** 5 Stars
Zoo Animals in Pretty Cages:
Everything in modern society is designed to force it's citizens, you and me, into little
molds. From the moment we are born, there are expectations on every aspect of what we
will become. Our parents read books telling them when we should crawl, walk, talk, even
get our first teeth. We are literally graded at every step of the way. If we don't fall into the
"normal" range, warning flags are sent up. Later, we are set in front of the TV where the
media reinforces the molds and constantly reminds us we must conform. Soon we are sent
to formal school where we are continually graded and judged and forced to conform to the
normal American mold. If we are good little boys and girls, we are rewarded, if we aren't,
then we have problems. We are constantly graded, judged and controlled by people bigger
and better than us: friends, family, school, media, all with one goal, to make us "good"
citizens. After school we throw ourselves into being good little citizens. We get a job and
start working our way up the ladder. We get married, have kids, buy a house and do
everything we can to keep up with the Jones' by obediently buying everything the media
instructs us to buy. Then, suddenly, in mid-life we realize we are miserable, that our life is
meaningless and we have no idea who we are or why we are here.
Can you relate to that? I know I can, it describes my life exactly. I followed the prescribed
pattern and lived in the pretty little cage society assigned me. I felt like I was an animal in
a zoo. My life was comfortable and easy, but deep down I knew I wasn't free, I was in a
cage. I didn't realize that I was the zoo-keeper and I had put myself in the cage. More than
that, I had the key to the cage, and could step outside of it at any time. But the cage was
mine, it was my territory, I had some freedom as long as I stayed inside my pretty little
cage and conformed to the mold. I wasn't happy, but I was safe. I knew I would have
food, water and shelter and I could have some fun as long as I stayed in my assigned
habitat and played my role. Then I got divorced and I was literally forced into living in a
van. It was like I had been thrown out of the very pretty little cage I had always lived in
and thrust into a life of freedom. At first I was miserable. This new life was very far out
of my comfort zone and I was terrified by it. Everyone judged me and told me I was crazy
and I felt lost without the identity society had always given me. I missed my safe, cozy,
pretty little cage. But gradually I started to embrace the freedom and fall in love with it.
My life was greatly less comfortable and safe, but I was free. And for the very first time, I
was happy. After 6 years of living in a van, I moved back into a house to live with a
woman. Then a very strange thing happened, I hated living in a house. I felt like a tiger in a
cage, constantly pacing back and forth longing to live free. Now, there was nothing wrong
with the house. It was a big log cabin on a beautifully wooded acre in a beautiful river
valley near Anchorage, Alaska. Having lived free, I was spoiled and couldn't live in a
cage again, no matter how comfortable and safe it was. The tiger was out of the cage, and
wasn't going back in. A few years later I retired and moved out of a house for the last time.
I moved into a small home-built camper on my pickup and headed out to live on public
land in the West of the continental United States. Three years later, I'm still living on
public land 365 days a year, 6 months as a campground host in the Sierra NF, and 6
months of dispersed camping on BLM desert land in Arizona, Nevada and California. I
take long walks in the wild every day and find peace and joy there. My hatred of being
caged keeps getting worse. I've come to hate being in cities. Just driving through one
makes my skin crawl. Every so often I have to go into one for shopping and supplies. I
have never been able to go to all the places on my list because I just can't stand to be
around all that traffic, noise and people for that long.
Slaves to the Consumer Society:
There is another way we give up our freedom in the modern world: Greed! The economy
of the modern world is primarily motivated by consumer spending. So each of us is
constantly bombarded by the media to buy the latest and greatest thing. The emptiness and
meaninglessness of our lives creates a hunger and longing for happiness that is temporarily
satisfied by buying the latest and greatest thing. Soon, that hunger and need controls us and
we find ourselves constantly buying more stuff. We hope all that stuff will become a
fortress of safety from our fears, but instead it becomes a prison, another pretty cage of our
own making.
Moving into the tiny space of a car, van or RV is like going cold-turkey from an extremely
addictive drug. When you find out how little you can have in your new home, you will
have to start getting rid of it. You will almost certainly find it very emotionally difficult. If
you persevere through that, many people find themselves constantly craving more stuff.
Chances are pretty good you will even give in and go buy more stuff and then discover
there just isn't room for it and end up getting rid of it. I can say from personal experience,
it is an expensive lesson to learn. Just like any other addiction, the need to keep buying
stuff is in control of your life, and you won't be free until you break it's hold over you.
Vandwelling and spending time in nature will change you from the inside out. The peace
and joy you find will change you at a very basic level.
Freedom To Wander:
The typical American works at a job he hates, with people he doesn't like, to buy things he
doesn't want. She or he is caught in a cycle of needing a job to get money, but the job
makes him miserable so he buys more things to make him feel better, which makes him
need more money, which traps her in a job that makes her even more miserable, and so on
forever. Making the leap into vandwelling breaks that vicious cycle by drastically
reducing your need for money. You will no longer spend a very large percentage of your
income on rent or house payments and on utilities. Plus, you are forced to stop spending
money on "stuff" because there is nowhere to put it. When you think about it, by
eliminating those costs, you have very little need for money. You still have to buy food,
gas, maintenance on your vehicle, vehicle insurance, entertainment and miscellaneous
expenses. With your need for money so reduced, you gain the freedom to change jobs or
work reduced hours. Or, you can keep working at the old job, and start saving large
amounts of money. For example, if you were making $2000 a month, and your housing
costs were $1000 a month, when you move into your van, you have an extra $1000 a month
of disposable income. It's crucially important that you not just blow that money by buying
more worthless junk. You want to keep paying your landlord just like you were before,
except now you are the landlord and you are putting that money into a savings account for
yourself (or using it to pay off any debt you may be carrying). After 6 months, you will
have $6000 in savings. Since you have been living on $1000 a month, that means you can
quit your job and travel for 6 months, or until your savings run out. When the money runs
out, you stop traveling and find another job. Maybe you like to ski, so you work all winter
at a ski resort and then when you get laid off in the spring, you can draw unemployment
and take the summer off and travel. Or you can do like I do, and work as a campground
host all summer, a job I love! Because I'm given a free campsite and I am very remote, I
spend very little money except on food, so at the end of the season, I have saved nearly all
my wages. Then, when I am laid off in the fall, I draw unemployment and live very
cheaply all winter in the desert on free BLM desert land. Vandwelling gives me the
freedom to wander and travel. Best of all, I live 365 days a year in beautiful, wonderful,
life-changing nature.
This isn't pie-in-the-sky stuff, I know many other people just like you and me who are
living a free life as vandwellers. You can do it! All that's holding you back is you!
Everything in modern society is designed to force it's citizens, you and me, into little
molds. From the moment we are born, there are expectations on every aspect of what we
will become. Our parents read books telling them when we should crawl, walk, talk, even
get our first teeth. We are literally graded at every step of the way. If we don't fall into the
"normal" range, warning flags are sent up. Later, we are set in front of the TV where the
media reinforces the molds and constantly reminds us we must conform. Soon we are sent
to formal school where we are continually graded and judged and forced to conform to the
normal American mold. If we are good little boys and girls, we are rewarded, if we aren't,
then we have problems. We are constantly graded, judged and controlled by people bigger
and better than us: friends, family, school, media, all with one goal, to make us "good"
citizens. After school we throw ourselves into being good little citizens. We get a job and
start working our way up the ladder. We get married, have kids, buy a house and do
everything we can to keep up with the Jones' by obediently buying everything the media
instructs us to buy. Then, suddenly, in mid-life we realize we are miserable, that our life is
meaningless and we have no idea who we are or why we are here.
Can you relate to that? I know I can, it describes my life exactly. I followed the prescribed
pattern and lived in the pretty little cage society assigned me. I felt like I was an animal in
a zoo. My life was comfortable and easy, but deep down I knew I wasn't free, I was in a
cage. I didn't realize that I was the zoo-keeper and I had put myself in the cage. More than
that, I had the key to the cage, and could step outside of it at any time. But the cage was
mine, it was my territory, I had some freedom as long as I stayed inside my pretty little
cage and conformed to the mold. I wasn't happy, but I was safe. I knew I would have
food, water and shelter and I could have some fun as long as I stayed in my assigned
habitat and played my role. Then I got divorced and I was literally forced into living in a
van. It was like I had been thrown out of the very pretty little cage I had always lived in
and thrust into a life of freedom. At first I was miserable. This new life was very far out
of my comfort zone and I was terrified by it. Everyone judged me and told me I was crazy
and I felt lost without the identity society had always given me. I missed my safe, cozy,
pretty little cage. But gradually I started to embrace the freedom and fall in love with it.
My life was greatly less comfortable and safe, but I was free. And for the very first time, I
was happy. After 6 years of living in a van, I moved back into a house to live with a
woman. Then a very strange thing happened, I hated living in a house. I felt like a tiger in a
cage, constantly pacing back and forth longing to live free. Now, there was nothing wrong
with the house. It was a big log cabin on a beautifully wooded acre in a beautiful river
valley near Anchorage, Alaska. Having lived free, I was spoiled and couldn't live in a
cage again, no matter how comfortable and safe it was. The tiger was out of the cage, and
wasn't going back in. A few years later I retired and moved out of a house for the last time.
I moved into a small home-built camper on my pickup and headed out to live on public
land in the West of the continental United States. Three years later, I'm still living on
public land 365 days a year, 6 months as a campground host in the Sierra NF, and 6
months of dispersed camping on BLM desert land in Arizona, Nevada and California. I
take long walks in the wild every day and find peace and joy there. My hatred of being
caged keeps getting worse. I've come to hate being in cities. Just driving through one
makes my skin crawl. Every so often I have to go into one for shopping and supplies. I
have never been able to go to all the places on my list because I just can't stand to be
around all that traffic, noise and people for that long.
Slaves to the Consumer Society:
There is another way we give up our freedom in the modern world: Greed! The economy
of the modern world is primarily motivated by consumer spending. So each of us is
constantly bombarded by the media to buy the latest and greatest thing. The emptiness and
meaninglessness of our lives creates a hunger and longing for happiness that is temporarily
satisfied by buying the latest and greatest thing. Soon, that hunger and need controls us and
we find ourselves constantly buying more stuff. We hope all that stuff will become a
fortress of safety from our fears, but instead it becomes a prison, another pretty cage of our
own making.
Moving into the tiny space of a car, van or RV is like going cold-turkey from an extremely
addictive drug. When you find out how little you can have in your new home, you will
have to start getting rid of it. You will almost certainly find it very emotionally difficult. If
you persevere through that, many people find themselves constantly craving more stuff.
Chances are pretty good you will even give in and go buy more stuff and then discover
there just isn't room for it and end up getting rid of it. I can say from personal experience,
it is an expensive lesson to learn. Just like any other addiction, the need to keep buying
stuff is in control of your life, and you won't be free until you break it's hold over you.
Vandwelling and spending time in nature will change you from the inside out. The peace
and joy you find will change you at a very basic level.
Freedom To Wander:
The typical American works at a job he hates, with people he doesn't like, to buy things he
doesn't want. She or he is caught in a cycle of needing a job to get money, but the job
makes him miserable so he buys more things to make him feel better, which makes him
need more money, which traps her in a job that makes her even more miserable, and so on
forever. Making the leap into vandwelling breaks that vicious cycle by drastically
reducing your need for money. You will no longer spend a very large percentage of your
income on rent or house payments and on utilities. Plus, you are forced to stop spending
money on "stuff" because there is nowhere to put it. When you think about it, by
eliminating those costs, you have very little need for money. You still have to buy food,
gas, maintenance on your vehicle, vehicle insurance, entertainment and miscellaneous
expenses. With your need for money so reduced, you gain the freedom to change jobs or
work reduced hours. Or, you can keep working at the old job, and start saving large
amounts of money. For example, if you were making $2000 a month, and your housing
costs were $1000 a month, when you move into your van, you have an extra $1000 a month
of disposable income. It's crucially important that you not just blow that money by buying
more worthless junk. You want to keep paying your landlord just like you were before,
except now you are the landlord and you are putting that money into a savings account for
yourself (or using it to pay off any debt you may be carrying). After 6 months, you will
have $6000 in savings. Since you have been living on $1000 a month, that means you can
quit your job and travel for 6 months, or until your savings run out. When the money runs
out, you stop traveling and find another job. Maybe you like to ski, so you work all winter
at a ski resort and then when you get laid off in the spring, you can draw unemployment
and take the summer off and travel. Or you can do like I do, and work as a campground
host all summer, a job I love! Because I'm given a free campsite and I am very remote, I
spend very little money except on food, so at the end of the season, I have saved nearly all
my wages. Then, when I am laid off in the fall, I draw unemployment and live very
cheaply all winter in the desert on free BLM desert land. Vandwelling gives me the
freedom to wander and travel. Best of all, I live 365 days a year in beautiful, wonderful,
life-changing nature.
This isn't pie-in-the-sky stuff, I know many other people just like you and me who are
living a free life as vandwellers. You can do it! All that's holding you back is you!
In our rich consumers'
civilization we spin cocoons
around ourselves and get
possessed by our possessions.
Max Lerner
civilization we spin cocoons
around ourselves and get
possessed by our possessions.
Max Lerner
Unnecessary possessions are
unnecessary burdens.
If you have them, you have to
take care of them!
There is great freedom in
simplicity of living.
It is those who have enough
but not too much who are the
happiest. Peace Pilgrim
unnecessary burdens.
If you have them, you have to
take care of them!
There is great freedom in
simplicity of living.
It is those who have enough
but not too much who are the
happiest. Peace Pilgrim
All I want is to stand in a field
and to smell green, to taste air,
to feel the earth want me,
Without all this concrete
hating me. Phillip Pulfrey
and to smell green, to taste air,
to feel the earth want me,
Without all this concrete
hating me. Phillip Pulfrey