wow what an amazing adventure. so my buddy here who lives in prineville he wanted me to help him invest because he has a hard time investing and we’re also business partners. we  have our own departments his is

generational wealth management i’m the  lead engineering systems engineering management

department and we’re starting to come up with our stocks and mutual funds and how our investments would be structured. I  had this idea that we could call it the brothers band

because we’re both military his department and my department together would have our own stock and we’d call it the brothers band.ive been developing business partners

networking talking to people getting connected understanding what’s going on with the world

you know by foot and stuff and  well that’s kind of how i got where i’m at today right now

which is pretty wild and i’ll be raw with you i won’t filter my journalism if i don’t need to

you know like the only time i really filter is when  i’m just trying to respect other people’s privacy.  i don’t do

google analytics or anything like that to make my blog more popular i didn’t change my name to

something more like you know mainstream or something silly like that just not a sellout in that way.  i’m just like u  know level-headed and honest and challenge myself to be authentic and novel induce creativity. the scientist in me isolates in the woods to help me become

more creative. Most my  life growing up  i buy vehicles that needed to be fixed

I never bought one that was working perfectly.  my whole life I’ve

kind of forced myself into picking up projects that usually often kind of cause me a

lot of stress and anxiety and stuff like  how am I going to get to work how am I going to

get to college how am I going to get to class on time and all these things you worry about and

you know that’s just that’s who I am that’s my makeup

because you know I’ve mentioned it before I mentioned again here it’s like

Richard Feynman’s one of my idols as a as a theoretical physicist he

was always tinkering with stuff and fixing radios and the old tvs by switching the tubes

around or something and just doing it as a kid and people wondered how do you fix that stuff how do

you do that. He  just did it you know and  I always kind of put myself in positions where

you know, something like that is going to push me to the, between a rock and a learning spot,

instead of a rock and a hard spot, to give you  more insight

on me, like, how I kind of approach life.  I mean, it’s been the journey out here, I have so

much catching up to do, but I just want  to give more insight on all that, give you a lot of examples

on where that’s working, and where that’s happening, and stuff like that, but, yeah, so, two days ago,

well, a few days ago, I saw a vehicle on the side of the road for sale, and they wanted it for $1,200

or best offer, it’s a Ford Explorer 2005, seven-seater, and I was like, dude, man, you should pick up

this vehicle, like, you know,, we have money invested together.  I was matching

him, like, $280.

So, we had  $560 in our pool, I was telling him about this vehicle, because he wanted to have

another place to live, in case something happened, redundancy  your freedom, your backup plan. So i ask, do you want me to buy it for you,  you know, make him an offer,

the guy said he’d take whatever I offered him.

and my buddy’s like, well, just offer him, like, a hundred bucks, and I was like, that wouldn’t be

fair, bro, like, you could recycle that vehicle, like, metal alone, and everything, just recycling,

get about 300 bucks, so,  I don’t want to undershoot him, and, you know, I just want

to be an honorable person, like, respectful, .I got to respect myself at the end of

the day, too, having good

character, and  not taking the easy way out challenging myself, and, you know,

to succumb and surpass characteristic traits that I believe to be insignificant, like, not

contrastable, or, if that’s even a word, or have a lot of abstract, or artistic, you know, a lot of

painting on your canvas, it’s like a sunset, and that’s all they ever paint on

their canvas, and mine is, like, a Picasso, and other famous,

artists, like, what is that, Leonardo da Vinci, or whoever it is, these people, you know, these

famous artists, and stuff, like, my canvas can be cleared off, and I can have a completely

different painting than the last time, and that kind of versatility, I think, is keeping me more

pliable, and, you know, you don’t get stuck in your ways, like, you don’t get stuck with certain

biases, psychological norms that are happening so often in your life that you no longer,

really pay attention to them. I bring stuff up like this, you know, often, or every once in a while.

my philosophy on life, and it’s been holistic, and it’s been questionable, as my self-confidence

grows, so does my determination to be more eccentric, so it’s like, it’s like catching

at the flyweight, you know, you have like a big professional fight coming up, and you

got a flyweight you got to catch weight at. you know, you’re training,  harder than

anything than you’ve ever done in your life, you train extremely in harsh conditions, you

go in like a sauna in a wetsuit and lose like 15 pounds in a half an hour, just ridiculous

stuff like that, so anybody was able to pull out of that metaphor, or that simile, or whatever

it’s called there, what I’m trying to get at, I hope you get something out of it, but

this, the vehicle, I go back over there, they’re like, yeah,

we do that, you know, and they say, come back, you can come back 7 to 8 p.m. tonight, because I had

walked into town, and I mailed a box of rocks home to my sister, Rachel, in Minnesota, sent

to her house there, so she could make an art project, and walked around town, and explored

a little bit, but when I am heading my way out of town, they said, you know, you can

come by later tonight, and I said, I would be, because this is my way out back to my campsite,

eight miles out of town, up that road, that goes right where they lived, where the Ford was for

sale, so I go up there, and they’re like, I’m just looking at the vehicle, and they thought I was snooping.

so the aunt or whoever she is threatens to call the cops on me and i’m like

just looking at the vehicle i want to look under the hood some more i want to see how everything

is going on it see what it looks like i still had some questions im  telling

the guy just let me do a thorough analysis on it and i’ll pay you what i think it’s worth

and i wasn’t just coming up with the numbers by myself they said there

was some rattling noise in it and i’m just i’m realizing that i’m taking the gamble that it could

be a timing belt issue and that’s really expensive or it could be something simpler like a tensioner

pulley or an idler you know something that it’s just making some noise a click click click noise

and I  pretty much got ran off the land that night but i was like hey just give me a call



eventually i came back in the town a couple days later

and i had cash on me this time so i could do a cash offer i brought 400 bucks and

i was gonna i was talking to my buddies some more and trying to figure out where to put this bid at

and i wanted to kind of start at 280 so it’d be just what we were matched at for investment

investing so i i bid i say 300 i’ll do 300 on it and this is okay so as long as i get it to run

i’ll be happy if i get it to run i drive it just like half a mile down the road to the auto zone

and i get there and there’s these people

helping me they want to help me work on the vehicle it’s really quite amazing experience

like these auto zone workers would take their shirt off their back to help you

out it was it’s ridiculous it’s a small town it doesn’t feel like a regular auto zone it feels

like a family like they just  want to really help you and it was i can’t give you all

the details and everything because of course that privacy issue but just how kind and caring they

were and the whole pay it forward thing you know.

I meet a lot of people all the time who are like, we want to pay it forward.

And I was like, I want to pay it forward too.

How am I going to do that if you’re paying it forward?

Or like one lady suggested that you get the feeling of joy.

You know, the gift of giving is the feeling of joy.

And that resonated with me.

I was like,  that’s a great way to word that.

So, you know, I’m not rich by any means.

I’m actually in quite a bit of debt.

And I’m ignoring some of my financial problems.

I’m going to overcome it.

I’ve got confidence.

I don’t think I’m going to get stuck in a hole or nothing.

But I never take the easy way out.

I just usually never do it.

I’m building character.

I’m trying to nail Jell-O to a tree.

You know, it’s just, it’s that.

Work, the hard work that you have to do is just sweat and blood.

You know. It’s  hard to explain.

But I think you can tell when you meet somebody with a lot of character

that they  have a certain reverence or it’s not really like pride,

but it’s like honor and self-respect.

And when you have  these positive characteristic traits,

that are on your plateau or your platé,

for me, symbolically, it means something more

than just what is occurring in those moments.



It’s like expansionism for myself, my mind, my scientific curiosity.

You know, I feel as though I can be a bigger problem solver,

overcome larger problems.

Larger challenges, face big life difficulties with out even flaring

a nostril or something like this.

And so I’m, I’m working on that stuff.

And I’m constantly, I’m doing it a lot.

When I was younger, it was stressful with the cars instead,

not knowing if you’re going to get to work and all these things.

But , I’m continually doing it.

And sometimes people want to give to me.

They want to do something nice for me.

And I don’t always allow them to do it.

And I think sometimes I need to be more accepting of it,

to accept people’s help or their kindness and gratitude. Allow them to have joy.

I do think there’s a lot of value in me.

Like with all the education, I mean, I went to college for  13 years.

I’m like over 400 college credits.

I mean, one of my academic advisors is like,

you have the equivalence of three PhDs.

I know I’ve disciplined myself in education.

And I want to push the rock up the hill.

And I want all my business partners and my family to be there.

When I say family, I mean like people who are integrated

into the same goals and stuff as me.

Like same philosophy and caring and being a scientist.

And wanting to innovate and make the world a better place.

So I carry that stuff close to my heart.

Well, we pick up the vehicle and drive it down to AutoZone,

working on it.

And I end up sleeping in the parking lot that night.

I didn’t have it all fixed.

Some of the stuff was good.

Wake up, it’s really, really cold out.

My backpacking gear’s up in the mountains.

I just have a small day bag with me.

And I’m like, what am I doing?

You know, like, my gear is up there in the middle of nowhere.

Could be like a deer or some wild animals right now digging in my food bag.

I haven’t even been up there in three days now.

And it just is not really the smartest thing in the world to be doing.

So I’m like, what am I doing?

But I’m doing it.

I’m doing it.

I’m living this life.

This is the second day I’m in the AutoZone parking lot.

I worked on it all day.

Had some more people come in by.

And they’re just willing to help out, take their shirt out of their bag.

And it’s just an amazing thing.

And nobody wants anything really out of it.

They just want to be like, it seems like they just want to be appreciated more.

Like, they want to be valued.

Like, it’s like a self-respect thing.

And I think, like, just acknowledging people in that certain manner, it’s going to help.

It’s going to help.

It’s going to carry a lot more weight and volume throughout life.