Year End Review - 2019
Year End Review - 2019
Okay, Im not even sure how it can possibly be time fo me to be writing another end-of-year review, but somehow we woke up and it’s suddenly 2020. Mind blown.
“Time flies when you’re having fun” they say… so we must indeed be having a blast.
This year has been a complete whirlwind and it’s hard to believe how fast it has gone and without exercises like writing this review I’m not sure we’d even believe or remember half of what’s happened over the past 12 months.
But… thats exactly why we do this (or why we have for the past 6 years and have committed to continuing). Because taking the time to go back and reflect on the past is one of the many things that has allowed us to take control of our life/path and set the direction/trajectory in a way that makes us blissfully happy.
We just went back and read last years review and it seemed SO VERY far away. We had just wrapped up the process of starting a business building out campervans, had just moved onto the boat and we were still VERY MUCH in survival mode in terms of learning how to sail and keeping the boat running.
Now we’re a year into that journey and, well… we’re still in survival mode and trying to learn to sail and keep the boat running. =)
What went well in 2019
Im not sure a morning goes by that we don’t both wake up and feel like we’re still living in a dream that we haven’t woken up from yet. That there isn’t a period or two each and every day where we feel the need to pinch ourselves and see if this whole thing is really happening.
That about sums up our year, but we’ll break it down further just because…
Happiness/Goals
It certainly hasn’t been all highs through this process of moving onto a boat and teaching ourselves to sail… this lifestyle inevitably comes with a lot of work, a lot of chances for things to go wrong or for adrenaline to spike; but so far we cant imagine anywhere we’d rather be or any way we’d rather be doing it.
Almost every single time we return to our floating home we either think about or discuss the fact that “that’s our boat right there” and are in as much shock now as we were the day we first moved aboard.
Learning to Sail
Our unforeseen goal this year became to learn/teach ourselves to sail. Not much of a choice on that one actually if you want to live on a sailboat and hop between islands, but planned or not it certainly made the list.
Our adopted mantra for this huge undertaking was simply “learn one new thing a day” and we’ve slowly been learning and adapting as we go along… most days as it turns out, teach us several new things, but that’s okay.
Overall I’d say we crushed it.
We still have SO VERY MUCH to learn and I’m certain if we keep doing this our entire life we’ll probably still say the same, but overall we have become proficient at reading weather, choosing windows to sail (vs staying safely tucked away) and overall making the boat go to where/when we want it to go.
We have recently been trying to raise the bar a bit in terms of sailing in bigger winds and seas during short hops between islands. Seems far better to try new things with some form of backup plan (abort and head back to the island) rather than waiting until we’re in a big crossing and something goes wrong we aren’t yet prepared for.
All in things have gone very well (with the exception of some broken boat bits and an unfortunate “unplanned man overboard drill” a few weeks ago… which came with many lessons of its own, but certainly not the way we choose to learn them).
Travel/nomadic lifestyle
Killed it.
I think our entire life together, if you asked us where we’d spend all our time if it wasn’t for money, commitments or other reasons why we couldn’t… we would have both easily answered “on a tropical island”. No doubt that would have been quickly followed by “snorkeling all day”.
This year we spent every day on or off some Caribbean island soaking up the sun, playing in the water and snorkeling/diving with the marine life beneath. I scroll back through our instagram account (where we spend most of our time posting now that we seem too busy or too exhausted to update the blog) and it literally looks like someone else’s life.
Actually, it looks more like marketing material for some caribbean resort or charter company.
It’s truly unbelievable and we don’t take a second of it for granted… but it’s also clear we are living our best life.
We also had to deal with hurricane season, which meant having a set destination (Grenada) to hang out for far longer than we were comfortable, and having to move faster than we wanted to get there in order to be safe before the season started… so this year we’re excited to revisit many of the places that we barely had time to see on the way south and spend a bit more time exploring each and finding our favorites.
Work/Creative
Well…. I’ll try not to be too hard on myself here - we’ve been busy, and we’ve been very far away. Other things certainly took focus over the business(es).
That said, our goal was to find a way to keep ZENVANZ alive and I think we are doing that. At the beginning of the year when we left to move aboard, we offered the business (and all assets, and the client list and everything else) to several friends for free in hopes one of them could use it as an opportunity to quit the 9-5 and set their own schedule/work from home.
That didn’t really transpire, but we did find a friend who took it on as a “side project” after his other job and to test the waters of what it could become. That means I still worked a few hours a day as emails and calls came in (somehow, despite no marketing), and means that we continued to do a couple full/custom builds and several DIY kits for those who almost wouldn’t take no for an answer.
I didn’t take a dime for the work this year as I still believe in the value of the company and wanted them to decide on their own and unhindered by us if the business was profitable enough and they wanted to proceed; or if we needed to find someone else or another direction.
All in, the business still seems to have a ton of interest, has proven to be profitable (almost despite our collective efforts and distractions), we are still very proud of the work we’re doing and still excited for the future and what’s to come in the next year as everyone becomes more committed to its success.
Not so much at zenbox design… where we seemed to lack the time to do much of any work, pretty much from the start of ZENVANZ. The one project we took (mostly as an avenue to connect with an old colleague) started off fantastic, very creative, but ended about as bad as possible after some painters’ rags set the place on fire literally almost at completion. It was devastating for the owner (and a huge disappointment for us as well).
Fingers still crossed that the project revives (from the ashes) and we can still see the design/remodel come to life.
We had several conversations with prospective clients, coached a few people through early phases of an ADU build for free where thats what they needed… but nothing turned out to be that perfect client/design we look for to turn into a paid project.
Doing what scares us
This might be the last time this point is on our list of goals… It seems we may have gone a bit too far with this one. Everything about our current life scares us, pushes us, makes us uncomfortable.
This thing we’re doing is big. Understatement.
There’s just no other way to describe it. Even in the best of times things can go really wrong, but when you add in the very real impact of weather, the strength and uncontrollable nature of the ocean… our lives and our home could pretty much be considered at risk most of the time. Yikes.
Don’t worry… we spend most of our time making sure that’s not the case, studying weather and tides and patterns and making sure we are uber safe… but even with that there’s just an element of the unknown out here.
In the van if something broke down we could simply call AAA or a mechanic literally anywhere. If something goes wrong on the boat… things are immediately much more “serious”.
Most days sailing see fair shares of positives and laid back moments but are also contrasted by an equal number of adrenaline pumping moments of fear. Especially true right now as we’re in the season full of strong wind and waves and what seems to be a constant array of passing squalls that can immediately double (or worse) both the sea state and winds with little to no notice.
Oddly… amidst these conversations we’re also trying to decide our destination for next hurricane season and beyond, and instead of simply staying where we are (the safe route)… we have actually found ourselves discussing heading to the western Caribbean or even further (gulp) passing through the Panama Canal and on to the South Pacific.
That region of the world has to be among the most exciting places to imagine ourselves living/sailing over the next year(s)…but getting there - scary honestly doesn’t even begin to describe it.
Our Relationship
Always better, always stronger.
Yet… it wouldn’t be fair to not also describe the difficulty and impact of what we have been trying to do. In the way we have been taxed and tested both independently and together.
This thing that we’re doing is a greater test than we could have imagined and has pushed us to our limits and breaking points time and time again. It’s been lesson after lesson in communication, in patience, in understanding and in allowing each other to find our own balance.
We have always been polar opposites in almost all ways… that’s nothing new. But learning each others instincts/reactions to literally life threatening situations is something we couldn’t have possibly prepared for.
It’s impossible to know where one persons limit is, and often we find that while one of us might be having the best time ever, the other is actually at a point of terror that’s got them on the edge or is about to break them.
We are not only learning to sail, but learning to adapt to each other in high anxiety situations that have simply never occurred in “normal” day to day life.
We are VERY thankful that we have already mastered the other, more imperceptible difficulties that most other cruisers are dealing with. The downsizing, living nomadically, distance from friends and family, living in such a tight space with someone 24/7, constant open/transparent communication, etc.
We have already had years of experience at all of those things and find that we can truly focus only on the sailing and the safety (as if that’s not enough). I cant imagine also having to deal with the newness of having to learn how to communicate about all of those other new things at the same time. This sailing/safety thing is plenty for us, thank you very much.
Community
This was a full on win/loss.
The sailing/liveaboard/cruising community is fantastic. We have met countless new acquaintances and made full on lifelong friends.
We obviously have a ton in common, a nonstop list of things to talk about, vent about and discuss over sundowners and we have been amazed at how many other first year cruisers or even new sailors we have met along the way as well.
The downside here… is that we are VERY far away from home. While we did have a few good friends visit throughout the year and were ecstatic to have them, it was also clear that it’s simply very difficult for most of our friends to get the time off or afford to come this far for a vacation. We had a few planned that got canceled and we have a few more coming up in the new year that we can’t wait for… but the hardest part about this journey has easily been the absence of our friends/loved ones for most of it.
Karma certainly can’t fly (been that way for a while now) and short of an absolute emergency we don’t plan on leaving her or each other on the boat alone for a trip home… no matter how much we might want it right now. For now, we will simply have to wait it out and hope that others will want to come this way or that schedules get better moving forward.
Health/Excercise
This is a both/and category as well.
Oddly, despite not changing anything… we might be in almost the best shape of our life, meaning its mostly positive. Somehow the boat keeps you active.
Constantly in movement, constantly working on the boat, lugging groceries back from the store, etc. When we aren’t working on the boat we are almost always in the water swimming/snorkeling and/or chasing down our food… and between that and amazingly healthy eating habits (all thanks to Jen’s passion for cooking) we seem to be pretty darn healthy/fit.
The downside/drawback here. We’re living boat life, and as discussed both stresses and rewards are high and there’s a general feeling that its almost always “5 o’clock somewhere”, which means were probably spending a bit too much time at happy hour, sundowners or toasting our successes. I wouldn’t say its a huge problem, but we’re aware and we’d like to make sure we stay healthy and living this life and lifestyle as long as we can… so we’re looking to be a bit more “controlled” in our consumption/intake.
Hurdles/Areas for improvement in 2020
Business
We have nowhere to go from here but up. We chose to leap into this new life/adventure despite not having a clear cut answer for what it meant for the business we had just launched.
Its not that we didn’t/don’t believe in ZENVANZ, but we never planned to start it, and never had a long term plan for it. We started it to help friends thinking it was a win/win and it quickly became a lose/lose. We were so completely burnt out after last summer that the business was the least of our concerns. We saw a chance to jump on an opportunity to go live out an impossible dream today and nothing was going to stand in the way.
While the business wasn’t a focus in 2019 it did prove successful almost despite lack of attention and time. We are already in discussions with those back home about how to structure things better, how to grow the business and take a more steady stream of clients than the 10-12 we helped with builds this last year.
Obviously if Im going to continue spending time on the business we should do the work needed to make sure I get paid for that time and that the business has the processes and finances in place to be able to go after marketing/events/opportunities we feel align with our goals. Right now, sadly… we’ve been lucky to even say yes to clients as they offer to give us money.
Finances
Well, we really went and mucked this one up. ;)
I probably said it best last year - we just spent all our money on a boat rather than investments we had planned to help our financial future…
I would never advise it to anyone else and would have never thought we would do it ourselves… On one hand it fits perfectly with our mantra of living for today and turning dreams into a reality.
On the other… it’s a horrible financial decision and we’ll see what it means longterm. The simple truth is that while our daily/weekly expenses are about the same as they were in vanlife (despite living what can only be described as a luxurious dream-like lifestyle everyday). What we haven’t figured out how to deal with is the very quickly rising costs of maintaining/repairing the boat.
Even if it’s the once a year haul out and even if all goes well (which they didn’t for us)…the bills rack up really quickly. Add onto that the “normal” cycle at which things seem to break/wear out/disappear off the boat, and whatever savings we had left after buying the boat is drying up rapidly.
Also doesn’t help that I agreed to not take any money for my continued work on ZENVANZ over the last year in order to make sure the business continued to run as intended and not have to raise prices to our customers… The choice to move aboard a boat actually has impacts across our financial streams.
At current, we are considering selling one of our houses back home, which would help the saving issue but also will hurt our long term cash flow “plan”. Still not sure what will happen here, and we also have serious “pause” about the direction our economy might be headed back home, so there’s a bit of uncertainly all around about the best course of direction here.
All of that being said, we wouldn’t change where we are, knew this was a strong possibility on the way in and made the choice anyway… and we have reinvented ourselves a few times already, so I also wouldn’t say we’ve reached a point of any stress here (at least yet).
Balance
We’ve been working on this one for a while now and thought we were making strides over the last few years.
Now? Im not even sure balance is possible out here.
I constantly describe the difference between boat life and vanlife as “higher highs and lower lows”.
Every day is immense highs and lows. The best possible life we could imagine followed almost instantly and without warning by immediate FUBAR(f*d up beyond all recognition). Then, long periods of almost boredom, followed by what? Of course, almost immediate FUBAR.
Maybe our past struggles and work on balance allows us to handle it better than many/most… but balance isn’t a word I’d use to describe most of our year.
Maybe next time.
Art and Creativity
This seems to be a failure every year.
Here we are, out experiencing maybe the most inspirational year I can imagine but we’re also too busy for me to put time aside for art/creativity.
It is fair to say I’m finding a lot of value in the creativity/art of photos and logging our journey in images/quick stories on instagram… but overall id love to be doing SO MUCH MORE.
Put it back on the “needs work” list.
Writing/Sharing our story
Hmm… started the year great as I wrote about all the exciting islands we were visiting but then we somehow just kept getting more busy (and the speed of those islands increased faster than I could write about them), so the blog dropped off again a bit.
Most of the writing I’ve been doing in terms of “sharing” has been one on one with people who write in looking for help/ideas in making life change of their own. Its great, I love those conversations… but would still love to find a way to reach more people who might need it.
We did join a couple podcasts who reached out and wanted us to join them for an episode. You can hear us deal with some pretty difficult questions about making change during our time with the Mosaic Podcast, and at the end of the month you’ll be able to hear us talk about the fears leading up to a major life change (and after) with the Wandering Workers Podcast.
We also tried for a while finding a way to use video to reach a broader audience or try to help anyone looking that might stumble upon our story. We already know that we don’t want to walk around with a camera in our face all day, but we tried a few raw, unscripted “sundowner discussions" on youtube… Take a look if they might be helpful, but you would be one of the few! ;)
My focus remains and I’d like to do better… so we’ll keep it on the list.
Giving Back
I spend ample hours each week fielding calls from people who want to convert a van (and their lifestyle at the same time), but that’s still pretty focused and based in the business (even if I’m not getting financial benefit to do it).
We still want to help provide confidence to others and help them to make a leap of their own if they are looking for a way to do so… so we’re working on ideas on how to best do that.
We’ve been discussing offering a few “workshops” on the boat a year for those who are actively interested in and pursuing a change in their own life. A way to have a few people/couples come onboard to get away from the hustle/bustle of normal life and focus on dreaming/goal-setting etc and see if we can’t help facilitate some of those discussions simply by sharing our experiences and giving them a chance to meet and work with someone “on the other side” of the leap.
We’ll keep the blog posted as that develops, and certainly if anyone has an interest in that, and/or ideas on what would be most helpful please don’t hesitate to reach out and let us know!
Synopsis
Mostly, all good things!
We are thrilled with where we are and eternally grateful that we somehow put ourselves in a chance to live and experience what we would have always thought about as a dream-life rather than even something that had imagined our “future goals” list.
Right now, there’s very little we would change, but we also know we didn’t get here by relaxing, by sitting back and expecting more of the same, and we aren’t about to take a single second of it for granted.
If you haven’t yet tried this process of a personal year end review I can’t recommend it highly enough. Life simply moves by too fast, and at least for us if it weren’t for taking times like these to look at the big picture and re-adjust the trajectory, I’m pretty sure nothing would have changed at all over the last decade (or at least not in the directions we wanted/hoped it would).
It’s not only eye opening to go back and read whatever you scribbled down last year, but we give it immense credit for helping to set our path moving forward and the successes we’ve achieved.
And as always, whether it be on the review, goal setting for the future or anything at all we can do to help… please don’t hesitate to ask.
