Fear, Exposed – Featuring Amy Bowman

Here we are again – another Tuesday, another incredible story of REAL people overcoming their fears, challenges & struggles in order to live life on their own terms.  For some, this may mean doing passionate work that puts some sass into their soul.  For others, it might mean a mobile lifestyle & sexy digital nomad prowess.  For me, it means a combination of the above + anything dark chocolate.  For the Bowmans, it meant freedom, experiences & exploration–and a reincarnation of long-lost dreams.

Amy is a waldorf homeschooling mom and aspiring fiber artist. Riki has left behind his long time corporate office to work at a fine restaurant and work on his photography which can be seen at the Taos artist co-op gallery. They both strive for voluntary simplicity and dream of building a small off grid home one day. They now reside in beautiful Taos, New Mexico. You can see their blog at http://bowmanfamilyontheroad.blogspot.com/.

Dreams Might Get Put On Hold (But They’ll Always Be There)

I remember the first moment of clarity and purpose I had in my life.

I was in my early twenties working a 9-5 medical job. One day, it dawned on me that I didn’t WANT the life I was living–I wanted to live off grid like an old fashioned homesteader.

For the first time, I felt there was a way out; that my life had true purpose. ( I was never very career minded.) Day by day, week by week, I slowly began to plan just exactly how I would make it happen.  I was thrilled.

Then, good old life happened.

Partners changed, children were born, and my dreams collected cobwebs in the dark recesses of my mind.  Nevertheless they were always there.

Fast Forward

Years later, I settled down in Florida.  My now-husband and I always shared similar goals, but neither one us ever knew how to get there. He had a stable career in civil engineering, which paid the bills and provided for our family. We were comfortable.  It was hard to walk away from that lifestyle…so we didn’t.  The problem was, although we were comfortable, we were unhappy.  I found myself regularly poring over blogs with other inspiring families doing revolutionary things, like remodeling school buses and traveling in RVs, and I wanted that–but I just couldn’t see how we could afford it, or fit it into our life.

Then, something devastating happened.

When the economy tanked two years ago, my husband was laid off from his engineering job. As a result, we were laid off from our comfortable lifestyle. This was our only source of income since I’ve always been a stay at home mom to our two children.

We began collecting unemployment–were at an all-time low.  Since we had hit rock bottom, it seemed as if there was nowhere to go but up.  It was then that we realized it was now or never; the time had come to finally do what we had always wanted to do.

We decided to buy an RV.

We paid cash for it like just about everything else. The biggest question I was asked when we announced that we were doing this was, “How can you afford it?” Fortunately, one of the best things we have done in our life is to pay cash for nearly everything, and not buy a house. When you aren’t indebted to car payments and mortgages you truly can just walk away. Our monthly expenses were already so minimal.  The answer seemed clear to me.

Despite the excitement of embarking on such an adventure for unknown parts, the doubts and fears were certainly there. I can’t count the number of occasions I was called a bum, and was told that it was despicable for a young family to do something like this when what we needed to do was get respectable jobs and take care of our family. Some family members ridiculed the used RV, questioning if it would even make it out of the state of Florida. How soon would we run out of money and come crying back home? Nothing like naysayers to boost your confidence. What if they were right?

Was this the sort of lifestyle only reserved for young single folks or could a family with major responsibilities really do it?

As it turns out, we did end up having an issue with the RV; repairs started draining our modest savings before we even left Florida. Then there was the stress of getting rid of everything. The kids could only keep a handful of toys due to space limitations. I made the inside of our Class C cozy–we painted, we hung family pictures, and put our own funky textiles in there. It was warm and home like.

Taking the Leap

We weren’t sure what to expect, but we took a deep breath, and a leap of blind faith, and we set off on our journey, not knowing whether or not we’d make it, but determined to try.

We were both born and raised in Florida. I had hardly ever traveled out of the state, so this was such a pivotal moment for us. I had spent my early twenties being afraid to do anything other than working a respectable job, and although motherhood gave me great courage, it also seemed to stifle my freedom to pursue those things I should have earlier in my life.

With all the courage we could muster, we headed west.  I’ll never forget the change of culture we noticed at our first rustic rv park. We met so many nice, laid back people living in tiny travel trailers. They were just so happy. They didn’t have much by our society’s definition, but they sure had peace of mind. That is what I wanted.

We continued traveling and found this to be true in most places. People take on a much different countenance when they don’t have the stress of jobs and fat bank accounts and debt weighing down on them. We met several families with little money and lots of character. I learned to flow with the universe and trust that we would be provided for, even if we had a breakdown–and, believe me, we had several of them. This was hard, as was everything else that was simply up in the air–not knowing what lied ahead down the road, whether or not my husband would ever find a job, and if we would run out of money before we could figure it all out.  But I just trusted that it would all work out somehow.

Discovering Beauty in the Neglected

We arrived in New Mexico and we were smitten. We were in awe with the desert and the national parks–what a luxury to be able to take our children to these amazing places. We were having a blast but needed to start making some tough choices. Money was running out, and we couldn’t keep joyriding across the country. We had to sit still, at least for awhile.

Then we came to Taos.

I had heard of it before, but never imagined falling in love with it. This was the utopia I had been searching for, the perfect combination of rural and cultural small town feel, absolutely breathtaking mountain landscapes.

To our disappointment, we quickly discovered that there were no engineering jobs–nothing that would fit my husband’s twenty years of engineering experience. I had a choice:  I could either live someplace I didn’t like with no job, or someplace I really liked with no job.

We chose to honor our dreams, and opted for the latter, despite the grim financial outlook.

I did worry at first; I was homeschooling, so work was not an option for me. Again, the burning question kept coming up:  WOULD WE RUN OUT OF MONEY?  We’d come so far; how would we make it all work?

The Answer

Our problem was quickly solved once we realized the one thing that would ultimately be crucial to our success:  All that time, we were simply defining work in the wrong way.  All that time we were limiting ourselves in thinking that a position in engineering was necessary, so that my husband wouldn’t waste the twenty years he had put into advancing his career.  But truthfully, the time he spent could never be recouped regardless, so he could either spend the next twenty years doing something he was miserable doing, or he could move forward into something that paid less, but that he actually enjoyed.

So, my husband took a job waiting tables at an upscale restaurant.

Within a couple of months time he was promoted to a managerial type position. It is worlds away from the corporate rat race, but we are so blessed by all of the changes. We went from living in a toxic city environment paying high rent, to living in large, quiet, open, beautiful spaces surrounded by the type of alternative housing we one day hope to build.

One Life to Live

I never, ever regret having made the leap. It only scares me to imagine where we would be in terms of happiness had we not taken the chance.

I am now a firm believer that happiness and wealth are not defined by a college degree, how much money you make, or how respected you are by your peers. Some of the happiest people I have met are living in the most modest ways.  I have also realized that the bigger-is-better mentality is a hoax; prior to our journey, I wouldn’t have considered anything less than a 3 bedroom house before. Now we are living in a one bedroom loft, and we’ve discovered that we rather like it.  This is probably one of the only countries where parents are guilted into believing that we must have all these separate spaces from our children.

I don’t know what lies in the future anymore than I did before in the mainstream world. My husband is now moving forward with his art, and is hanging his photography in a gallery.  I am delving more into fiber arts and hoping to sell handspun, hand dyed yarn at some point. I am thrilled to live in a place that supports this kind of creativity, and one day we do hope to build that modest off-the-grid home….just like I dreamed of in my twenties.

The way I see it now is that we are that much closer than we were before, and that is all I can ask for in terms of happiness. All of the money, respect, and wealth in the world could not fill that void. I only hope that instilling these values in my children will help us to build a new generation with different ideas on why we are here to live our lives on this planet. I leave you with one quote which came from a recent friend….

“When a door gets closed, a window will open.”

I urge you to crawl through that window.  You may be surprised at what you find.

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Tags: amy bowman, fear exposed, follow your dreams, lifestyle design, off the grid, personal development, RV living, taking big leaps, unconventional living