Being in Shanghai with very few of my possessions and far away from my bad habits has helped me distill the things that give me the most joy from the rest of the cruft in my life that was just taking up my time. I've been here for almost four weeks, and I've spent around $350 (with no free food, remember). I can't remember the last month that I've had less than $1500 in charges (with all free food), which makes me wonder what the hell I was spending my money on, because my quality of life hasn't changed much.
The only things I brought with me were clothes (10 shirts, 2 jeans, 3 shorts, 1 sweater, 1 sweatshirt, flip flops, 2 shoes, 1 towel, and underwear), iPhone, mac book, and toiletries. When I get back, I should (have Megan help me) audit the usefulness of all that shit sitting in my house. Why do I have 10 towels? Do I really need 4 computers? Why Why do I own 40 candles? (Mom?) It's more of a burden than a luxury from this perspective, because that crap is tying me down.
Things I find that I don't miss at all are Television (not surprising), DVD Ripping (thank god), random internet time (still more of that here than I'd like), and eating (incredibly surprising). In fact, I'm not sure I don't enjoy eating, I'm just sure that since I got food poisoning last week, I've been kind of sick of Chinese food in general, so maybe that'll pass and the fat kid inside will repossess my body. I'm just kind of sick of noodles and broth. In fact, some meat and starch would be delicious right now. Or a salad. What I wouldn't do for a iceberg wedge and some blue cheese dressing. So gay, but so good.
The things I've enjoyed most while I've been here these last two weeks are reading (3 books in 3 weeks - I'm a machine), working out, working, and exploring the city. Hopefully I'll make time to get to bed early, travel outside the city more, and maybe try to get good at meditating or something while I'm here. I'll go back to California a Buddhist zen master.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment