Friday, February 13, 2009

Doing vs. having

"Doing what you want can make having things you want seem a lot less important."

I read this sentence on a web site about living the simple life. It is so true. It's a lesson you learn very concretely on the PCT. It's also easy to forget once you step off the trail and start sinking back into your normal life.

On the PCT you are doing, not having and acquiring. It's the happiest way to live, in my opinion.

Once you settle back in to regular life and the TV starts working on you again, and you start feeling like a loser because you don't have an iPhone or you don't have any shoes that aren't for sports, and you start getting back in to having money and the means to buy things and pretty soon you are thinking maybe the cubicle is calling and it might not be so awful this time, it's easy to forget that doing is better than having.

And pretty soon you will have sold your time to someone else again. Time is the only thing in life you really have, and the easiest thing in the world to lose. And then what will have happened to the Trail? Did you bring it home or did you leave it behind?

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