The Adventurepreneur Origin Story Pt1

Just so you’re up to speed, my name’s Alia, and this is my secret travel journal. I’m a 20-something American girl living in my self-converted shuttle bus. This is where I share it all – the hilariously embarrassing truth about my adventures – and you’re about to see how it all started. This is the Adventurepreneur Origin Story Pt1. Now, go on, step inside… Welcome to the mayhem.

I Will Not Start With a Boy, So Help Me, God.

I don’t want to novelize my life. Yeah, I know, rich, coming from a girl who’s literally writing about herself. What I mean is, I don’t want to write myself as a character in a story. I don’t want to use “she” instead of “I.” This is raw and vulnerable and purely me, not some girl who went through it. I went through it.

I used to joke that you need a certain amount of ego to write your life story for others to read, and I assumed I was getting there. Now, I think you have to have a certain amount of humility.

I say this because I could easily start my story here:

A breakup with the so-called love of my life that had me on my sister’s couch at age 25, $4,000 in credit card debt and my bus/tiny-home broken down a thousand miles away. To top it all off, the startup I was freelancing for (my only source of income at the time) ghosted me the week of the breakup because the CEO was my new ex’s bestie.

But, that would give this boy too much space in my story, too much importance.  He deserves some importance, but not chapter one. Plus, a broken heart, seriously? How cliché can I get? Please.

I will not have my story, one that I literally have complete narrative control over, revolving around a boy.

No, this series is not starting with a broken heart, despite what you may already be thinking, and it is certainly not about him. In fact, the opposite. This series starts with the absence of him – the absence of everyone, really. That’s why I’m even bringing this up, because these stories are wholly written with the absence of everyone else’s opinions, perceptions and expectations – my secret journal. It’s a safe spot to unravel, to reveal my most vulnerable form, and to tell from “I” and not “she.” This is where I tell the truth. Here, take it.

I’ll Start By Setting The Disappointing Stage

Senior year of high school, I had it in my mind that I would attend college out-of-state and leave behind my home town in Florida. There was a whole world out there and I wanted to experience it. Above all, I would not go to the University of Florida (UF). Everyone in my high school wanted to go there and the hype was annoying as hell. I hated UF the same way I hated Justin Bieber: too many idiots drooling over it. My mom made me apply, though. “Just in case,” she said.

Lo and behold, UF was the best school I got into and I found myself a baby gator the very next year living in a building that was literally structurally built to spell out “UF”.

I had no idea what I wanted to do with my life and regularly cursed society for making me choose so early. But, there was one thing I was sure of: I would not be an English major. I knew I had a knack for writing but I didn’t want to teach, I didn’t want to write 30 page papers in a stuffy voice that wasn’t mine, and I didn’t want to admit to myself that my skill level only amounted to words on a page.  Plus, if I’m being honest, too many of my relatives studied English and I didn’t want to follow in their footsteps. I wanted to blaze my own trail – be different.

The Totally, Not-At-All Embarrassing Beauty of Being An Art Student

I entered college as a graphic design major. After designing for the high school yearbook and taking AP Art, I was drawn to the artistry and creativity of this digital world. And yet, soon, I felt completely out of place in my graphic design classes, and all around, a disappointment.

Everyone seemed very artsy-fartsy in a way I couldn’t relate to. People were introverted and mysterious, and the professor kept using the word “juxtaposition” like it was a filler word. It felt way too dramatic in a way I didn’t care for. For me, art was fun and could never be graded on a scale, it could only be.

You know when someone gets up on stage for karaoke, and they pick a very moving, sad ballad? Everyone quiets down expecting it to be good, but then it’s the worst thing you’ve ever heard? That’s what it felt like every time I presented my work.

I was the singer on stage trying to hold my own, completely making a mess of it, talking seriously about something everyone clearly thought was trash. And it was trash, because I was basing all my design decisions on what I thought others would approve of instead of what I actually liked. So the result was a half-assed piece of poser work that even I didn’t like. (Not my finest hour.)

K.O

So, I switched majors and graduated with an English degree. Yup, you heard me. Writing was the only thing I could do confidently, even though I still didn’t want to go into any job that an English major would typically go into. It was a choice out of desperation knowing the clock was counting down to graduation, and I had to do something. Looking back, I see how the art program failed me and how I failed myself. They didn’t provide me the space to embrace and curate my own style, and I didn’t have the confidence to demand that space.

Upon graduating, I was determined beyond belief not to end up back at my parents’ house. That would be the worst possible hell that could happen, not because I hate them or anything (I love my family, and I am so grateful to always have a home there), but because if I went back, it would mean failure.

I was up for two internships with National Geographic, one for video storytelling and the other for journalism. Those were plan A and B. If they didn’t work out, plan C would be joining the Peace Corps, because why the hell not? Plan D was becoming a flight attendant so I could get paid to travel. I had it all figured out – the one time in my life I actually had a plan, knew what I wanted, and was prepared.

Then, in came COVID.

My First Rock Bottom

Remember how I said I had it all figured out? National Geographic internships, Peace Corps, flight attendant gig? So many pretty options wrapped in sweet little bows! Well, life looked at my perfectly crafted options and said, “That’s cute. Hold my beer.”

Internships? Canceled. Peace Corps volunteers were sent home. Travel was deemed dangerous and everyone had to stay out of airports. Worst of all, every company on the planet was firing people, which meant any chance of me finding a job just became impossible.

Ribbon-wrapped options turned into shrapnel bombs. There I was, a fancy degree in hand as my dreams went up in smoke. So, what happened?

…I had to move. Back. Home.

My greatest nightmare, now reality. I had officially hit the cold, childhood bedroom floor of rock bottom.

My days consisted of waking up late, forcing my feet out of bed, applying to every job I could possibly qualify for on LinkedIn, and trying to ignore my dad when he asked me how the job hunt was going. I wanted to scream through every waking moment. My heart was anywhere but those job applications, and after a couple months, I knew something needed to change.

I wasn’t made for the corporate world. I knew it each time I read a job description and felt pure dread rising in my blood. Picturing my days, each one the same as the one before, I nearly cried. I don’t know why I had such a visceral reaction to what everyone else in society deemed a “normal life” – actually, it’s just that, the word “normal” – normal was my nightmare. I had too many dreams for “normal.”

The Adventurepreneur Call To Action

Then, one normal day, I was sitting in front of my computer screen ignoring LinkedIn as it glared at me begrudgingly, scrolling Instagram on my phone. That’s when I discovered it:

Vanlife.

I saw a girl who was traveling the U.S in a Sprinter Van with her dog. She was somehow making money off her vanlife blog, and I suppose had other sources of magical income? I had no idea, but it was happening. She was real, and her lifestyle was an actual way people could live. Seeing her do it, living an unconventional life of adventure, I could feel my heart re-inflating, relinquishing its hopeless raisin form.

This was the answer. This was freedom. For the first time in what felt like forever, I had direction. A weird, unconventional, slightly terrifying direction (that my dad was just thrilled about) – but a direction I actually wanted to follow. This was how my life was going to look, and this dream was not going to get tossed aside like the others. I wouldn’t let it. Not this time.

Advice for the Next Adventurepreneur

It’s clear how delusional I was about vanlife being the answer to all my problems, I realize that. I thought I would turn into a different person, and in a lot of ways, I actually did. It’s not clear why after one Instagram scroll I had this magical version of vanlife in my head that spun it as non-stop freedom, natural wonders, and adventures. But, that’s what social media was selling and that’s what I felt I was promised.

Unfortunately, what I was buying into was not entirely accurate to what was advertised.

I actually only recently felt the weight of this realization, 4 years into my vanlife journey, when I saw on Instagram that an old friend from high school had bought a VW Bug to do vanlife.

“You’re doing it!!! 🚐 💨,” I DMd him at 11:01am. He responded at 7:06pm with, “Does it always suck so much haha 🥲.” Uh oh.

It dawned on me that I had done absolutely nothing to subdue the glorified version of vanlife that master content creators paint with their vintage cameras and perfectionist editing skills. I was part of the problem.

But the thing is, when I reflect on vanlife, it kind of is magical.

Years of break downs, and sleazy mechanics, and handling my own waste, and flooding my bus, and getting stuck in mud, and truck stop showers, and oil leaks, and searching for water, and dealing with grey water tank smells, and blowing tires, and finding animals in the bus, and living in small quarters, and losing cell service, and taking cold showers outside, and literally so many other things has still not soured the essence of it for me. The magical things on Instagram? I’ve seen them in real life; I’ve lived them. For me, the good outweighs the bad every time, and I hear a lot of vanlifers say the very same thing.

That being said, I think there are two very specific distinctions vanlifers aren’t making about that statement: “the good outweighs the bad.”

Firstly, everyone’s definition of a good experience that could outweigh a bad experience is different. For example, I thought I had lice in the bus and I spent an entire day in a sketchy little laundromat washing clothes, sheets, curtains, everything. Then, I spent that night parked in the middle of a dusty cow field combing little lice cells out of my hair while every cloth thing I owned sat in a pile on the floor.

BUT, the night before, I got the most beautiful sunset over the mountains that literally had me in grateful tears thinking about how lucky I was to be there. That 30 minutes of bliss was worth a day of yuck. For me, the good outweighed the bad, but for other (maybe normal) people, it might not.

Secondly, you have to have a kind of breezy attitude towards unfortunate events that make bad situations seem like hiccups instead of heart attacks. Yes, I’ve had a few heart attack moments on the road, but everything I just mentioned in the last couple paragraphs were hiccups. Honestly, some of them were hysterical as hell – fun even. If that’s not you, that’s totally fine. But, if you know you’re the type of person who usually takes hiccups as a heart attacks, vanlife will be rough as hell.

I’m not saying this to discourage you, I would highly recommend vanlife to anyone who’s interested in it. I only say this to bring to light some truth, or at least my take on the truth. Despite everything, I would do it over again the exact same way. I’m a better, more confident person because of it.

If you’re in the same kind of boat I was in at the start of my vanlife journey or you’re wondering if it’s for you, read some more of my travel stories HERE. That will surely take the magical social media veil off vanlife, if that’s what you’re looking for. Or shoot me an email – tell me what’s up. I’m here for it.

Love you, good luck, and stay sane.

Alia

Next time on Sent Packing: Alia’s Secret Journal

The Adventurepreneur Origin Story, Pt2: How the in the world was I going to earn money on the road and make this dream my reality?