Jaemin Yi | Travel, Creativity, and the Pursuit of Awesomeness

I try not to buy shit anymore. Oh sure, I still gotta buy things like toothpaste and socks. But for the most part, I don’t buy. I “temporarily own”.

Not only has this made it easier for me to travel and start new hobbies, but it’s also saved me a TON of money.

Huh? “WTF is this”, you ask?

Well, basically, when most people buy something, they see it as THEIRS. They own it. It belongs to them for life. And the money they dropped for it is – *poof* – gone forever.

My perspective is just a slight shift in thinking, but it makes a huge difference:

I see everything I buy as something that I’m just borrowing. It’s not MINE. I won’t have it for life or start associating it with who I am. It’s just mine temporarily. And the money I spent on it, is also, only temporarily gone.

And while I have it, I’ll use the hell out of it. I’ll squeeze every single drop of usefulness out of it that I can.

But the moment it stops being useful, or I outgrow it, or it stops helping me live a happier, more fulfilling life…I’ll flip it on Craigslist to someone who’ll get more out of it than I will.

Like I said, it seems like an insignificant difference. But this mindset towards buying has benefitted my life in a bunch of unexpected, really awesome ways:

I am not a morning person. No way in hell.

Which sucks because doing your mornings right is absolutely CRUCIAL to living an epic life (I’ll explain below).

For those of us setting our own schedules (the self-employed, un-employed, and in-between), handling our mornings can become one of the most epic challenges we’ll ever have to face.

With no office job holding our asses accountable, it’s way too easy for our mornings to take control of us, and not the other way around.

Believe me. Ever since I started freelancing 3 years ago, I’ve been fighting a daily battle against Shitty Morning Syndrome, and more often then not, I’d get my ass beat.

If you’ve been there, you know what it feels like. Waking up feeling completely unmotivated. Hitting “snooze” over and over (and over) again. Lying in bed mindlessly checking e-mail. Staring at the wall, unable to decide what to do first (and already feeling overwhelmed).

And then before you know it, it’s 3pm and you’ve gotten jack shit done. Your eating schedule’s all thrown off. You’re too drained to workout. Your entire day is screwed and you feel guilty and angry at yourself for letting this happen…again.

As someone who wants to do a lot before his short life is over, I hate hate hate these wasted mornings (and the wasted days that would follow).

I got mugged in Colombia. And it was all cause I was trying to get some.

Before you judge, let me back up and explain.

So it was my last night in Colombia. I had spent 31 incident-free days living it up in Medellín (the city made famous by it’s legendary women, Pablo Escobar…and Entourage) but now it was time to say adios.

My buddies Sol and Sean threw me a Despedida (farewell party) and I swear, it was like out of a movie. The whole night, all these characters I had met over the past 4 weeks showed up to send me off.

My salsa dancing teacher. The crazy, tri-lingual Swedish sisters. The Reggaeton producer who became my closest parcero (‘friend’ in Medellín-talk). The backpacking Canadian fiance’s. My Brazillian and Dutch guitar-mates.

Man, it wasn’t until the Despedida that I realized how much I was going to miss Medellín.

The night was a whirlwind of dancing, pizza cooking, and Aguardiente drinking (not necessarily in that order) and before I knew it, it was already 4am and time to bounce.

After a few heartfelt goodbyes, I grabbed a cab with the Colombian girl I’d been dating and we booked it out of there. And this is where I started to make a series of mistakes.

Are any of you out there struggling with creativity? Is it not fun anymore? Maybe even frustrating as hell? Does it leave you wondering, “Maybe I was never meant to do this shit in the first place”?

Trust me, you’re not alone.

Here’s something most people don’t know about me: even though I’m a professional filmmaker, I’ve been struggling with creativity all my life.

Maybe “struggle” isn’t the right word. It’s been more like a “vicious, hair-pulling, bloody battle” with creativity.

But I’ve finally gotten past it. Thank the lord, finally. And just like my struggle with sticking to a workout routine, it wasn’t anything wrong with me. It was just a simple mindset change.

All my life, I’ve been one of those guys who could never stick to his workout plan.

I’d always start off with plenty of enthusiasm. I’d research the hell out of my workouts, set strict meal plans, have a specific goals of X pounds of muscles within X weeks…

But by week 3, I’d already get bored. Start slacking. And once I miss a workout or cheat on my meal, it was all downhill from there. And yes, this happened many, many times.

Was I just lazy? Did I just not have any self-discipline? At the time, I thought the answer was most definitely “Yes…you just suck at life.”

But let’s fast forward to now. I’ve been working out consistently for the past 2 years. I’ve been eating a healthy paleo/primal diet for the past 8 months. I feel better and look better than I ever have before.

I finally f#%*ng did it! But how? Did I miraculously become a self-disciplined, non-lazy, ass-kicking machine? Hell no.

The only difference is that I changed my reason for working out.

When I was a kid, I was obsessed with reading. You know, up until 4am reading under the covers until my eyes hurt. You couldn’t stop me from reading

But as I got older, something changed.

Maybe the forced reading we had to do at school took the joy out of it. Or maybe girls and a social life started getting in the way. Whatever the reason was, all I know is that reading slowly became something “I used to do” but now never had time for.

Well, not anymore. I’m back to devouring books at an insatiable rate. I’ve cut down on mindless internet time to make more room for meaningful reading time. I’m officially, 100%, head over heels in love with reading again.

And I owe it all to a little thing called the Kindle.

Now how the hell did a frickin e-reader rekindle my love for reading? Good question. Especially since I used to be like a lot of you out there, moaning about how “the feel of paper can never be replaced”.

But the truth is, ever since I got my Kindle a year ago, my reading life has completely changed. And it’s stayed that way. I’ve spent a lot of time trying to figure out how the Kindle pulled this off, and here’s what I’ve boiled it down to:

1) Less Wasted Time and More Reading Time

You know all that wasted time you have in a day? Standing in long lines. Waiting for a friend to show up. The breaks in-between your Pomodoro’s.

Now I turn all that wasted time into productive reading time. Since the Kindle is so small and compact, I almost always have it with me for all those wasted moments.

And get this – if I don’t feel like carrying the Kindle around, I still always have my book with me because of the Kindle iPhone app. The bookmark even automatically syncs so I can immediately pick up where I left off. Now I NEVER have an excuse not to be reading.