Changes—Writing from Istanbul
Shifting tides in my life, and thoughts from two weeks in Turkey.
It’s Monday morning in Istanbul. I’m writing from a cafe just across the street from my hotel. It’s been a few weeks since I’ve published a story. I’m going through an interesting chapter. Things are changing. The big things being that I’m taking a break from writing online and from my podcast.
I started my new job working at a cafe in Oakland. I’ve wanted to just focus on that, and on writing my book about my time in Japan.
It’s felt good.
The need to do more
There’s a power in releasing the need to do more—a need that we all feel in our modern age. We think we have to do more to be happy, or successful, or different. But that need only means that we’re not free. We’re addicted to busyness, me as much as anybody. I’m scared that if I’m not doing more, I won’t get to where I hope to go.
When I don’t do, I don’t feel like I’m enough as a person. And that’s the issue with modern life. How much we do determines our worth. I’m tired of it. It’s counter-culture to just be with yourself, enjoying the peace of non-doing. I’m not a workaholic.
I want to be an artist. Not necessarily because of what I do, but because of how I live. Slowly. Thoughtfully. With intention and introspection.
There’s art to being a barista. Presence. It feels good to make something with my hands, to feel myself getting better, making tweaks here and there. And then after a morning at the coffee shop, I get to come home and work on my book.
I won’t be a barista forever. But for now, it’s cool. My dream is to get paid to write books. A simple, beautiful life. I want to live on my terms, write books, and do it in a way I truly enjoy. I don’t need to be the best. I don’t need to make tons of money. Let me work on things I love, and do it in a way that only I can.
Nobody has it figured out
In our twenties, there’s a pressure that we have to be grinding or making a mark. Maybe it’s because we’re fresh out in the world, figuring things out for the first time. So we’re trying to prove ourselves. But what does it mean to have it figured out? Nobody has it figured out, because there’s nothing to figure out.
There’s just life moving forward, our story unfolding. Still, we want things to happen a certain way. We base everything—mostly our happiness—on expectations. Desires. But so often, we don’t even know what it is we desire.
The stress is unnecessary. Life is unfolding, no matter what we do. And we can either enjoy the ride, or worry about it every step of the way. I’m thirty now, and I just want peace in my heart and soul. I don’t want conflict. And that doesn’t mean difficult things won’t happen.
I’m experiencing difficult things now. This chapter hasn’t been easy, but it’s been incredibly meaningful. All in all, things are changing for the better. I’m being easier on myself. For instance, when exercising, I’ve done less instead of feeling the need to push myself to the brink every time.
The pain in my body is fading, slowly but surely. I know I’m making progress, even on the difficult days. And progress, honestly, is knowing when I’ve done enough. Enough is all that’s needed for me.
Why are we here?
Why are we alive? We’re born and have some time on Earth; nothing comes with us when we go. Here in a blink, gone in a blink. And while we’re here, we have to go through shit. We have to feel pain deeply. It feels like there’s no escape—a black hole—and it makes me wonder: why?
What is the point of being born to feel such pain? It feels normal because life is all we know. We’re here, and we experience pain and wind and falling leaves—I cried a lot the week before I came to Istanbul. It felt good. Maybe we’re alive just to be alive. To feel something. To know pain, and love, and laughter, and friendship, and loss; I’ve felt these things a lot lately. Even here in Istanbul.
What’s Istanbul like?
This city is romantic. Primordial. Deep. The people are very kind. The neighborhoods are more varied and charming than I imagined, with cats roaming the streets and hanging out at every cafe. They add a sort of softness; a warmth; people feed them. Each restaurant has its cat. You’ll find them in some funny places, in the rafters and in between cushions. They’re all different, with their own personalities. They just wanna be cozy.
I’ve been running through the city.
I run by the water, looking out past the river into the sea, its surface blue, steely gray, constantly moving. I’m on the European side, literally looking across the river—the Bosphorus—upon Asia.
This vast waterway gives the city such a unique identity, unlike any place I’ve ever known. When planning this trip, looking at Google Maps, I had no idea what was what. I honestly knew very little about the city at all, besides the fact that back in the day, when it was called Constantinople, it was the capital of the Eastern Roman Empire (Byzantine Empire). Then it was the capital of the Ottoman Empire from the 15th-century until the 20th-century.
Looking at the map, you’ll notice what’s called the Golden Horn, a waterway that appears as a thin vein stemming from the Bosphorus, splitting the European side of the river into two.
At dusk I run across the bridge over the Golden Horn and can see all three points—the two sides of the European Side and the Asian side across the river—meeting at this congregation. And that feels like Istanbul. A meeting of points. Different environments, minds, cultures and people.
From here looking out into the water, everything seems so vast, majestic, so much more than just a thin vein on the map. The waves of the river have an ancient energy. From water, the ancient world was explored. The ships drift through the light of dusk. I gaze in awe at the mosques on the distant hills, their silhouetted spires stemming into the melty pink sky; the islands, far away on the horizon.
By day, drifting through the beautiful decay, often while hearing the prayer amplified from every mosque, illuminates the essence of the past. At night, taking a ferry from one side of the river to the other provides a different, modern energy. Lights shine like stars throughout the cityscape. Colors radiate. It feels like looking back at the city from the water in Hong Kong.
This city’s been here for thousands of years before me. Will be long after I’m gone. But I get to come here and be here for a while, observe the way the light changes, the colors dance, the sun and moon rise and fall.
And it’s beautiful here, discovering more of who I am, letting go of what I’m not. And this is who I am.
I run through the city. I find a calisthenics park in whatever city I’m in. I make friends and eat and drink and smile at strangers. I love wandering the streets, pushing myself, but also taking it easy. I love the feeling of running on cobblestone, under mosques and by large, crumbling stone walls. Through squares of people.
I don’t really care about writing about what to do in Istanbul. I write about being here and how it makes me feel. And I feel alive.
The start of my second week here
Two of my best friends were with me the first week, one from San Francisco, who I’ve known since college, and the other from England, my best friend from living in Japan. How insane that I can say, hey man, I’m going to Istanbul in two weeks, and I have a friend on the other side of the world who will meet me there at the drop of a hat? And one from home who was down to go? It’s so incredibly special.
There’s a paradox to being human, at least one that I feel. On the one hand, I want to travel the world while I’m young and able to so freely. I want to spend time in India. Walk the Camino de Santiago. Visit China, and South America, and countless parts of Europe, Asia, and Africa. Not to mention more of the U.S.
But there’s also a desire to set down roots. I’ve been doing that in Oakland, and it feels good. But being here, having already made friends in Istanbul, I’ve realized that my roots are international. I can’t be afraid to entertain my wanderlust if it’s what my soul craves.
I make friends wherever I go, so I can’t be afraid of going.
I thought that when my friends left I was going to go somewhere else in Turkey. I had planned to ask people here where I should go. But then I got here and felt overwhelmed with options. I decided to just stay here in Istanbul, and it feels right.
The trip is different when on my own than with my friends.
Yesterday, for instance, I just bounced around cafes, sketched, journaled, and watched life drifting on by. That’s my favorite thing to do.
I don’t need to constantly move to see more of the world. I like to stay still, so I can watch the world move.
What else do I have to say? Not much for now. Maybe too much to put down in words. It’s raining. There’s something about a city in the rain that fills me up. The cold. Enhanced colors. The sky subdued, no shadow, just a monochrome vibration of things happening, life taking place. And I get to be a part of it.
Keep livin’ and learning honey, that’s what it’s all about💜