SSP 019: Steve Clemens – Finding Connection Through Disconnection, Life Lessons Learnt Through Self-Sustained Living

Wow, this is an exciting one. In this episode in the State Shifters podcast, I've got someone who I met in a really interesting way. I kind of went up to five hours north of Ontario in a place called Nipissing. Well, it was near Nipissing, not directly in it. I was there on just a little getaway with my girlfriend and a friend about a month ago now. And my girlfriend booked this place through Airbnb and I kind of showed up not really knowing what to expect. It was basically just a cabin in the woods. It said off grid on the title. And I kind of didn't really know what to expect when you hear see off grid, fully self sufficient, literally in the middle of nowhere. So we showed up at this Airbnb and we're welcomed by a gentleman named Steve. And my first impression of Steve, he kind of reminded me sort of like Bear Grylls and just super kind and genuine. And he showed us into his cabin that he had built himself from the ground up, all by himself. And I was amazed by how well put together this place was for someone who did it all himself. And there was no electricity, so he constructed it. There was solar powered, solar powered freezer there, but apart from that there was no electricity. It was all self contained, off the grid. And I was just blown away because it was so peaceful out there. It was great to get away from the city and the noise. And when I walked into the cabin and put my bags down, I looked up and underneath the staircase there was a bookshelf. And on the bookshelf there was, there was quite a few books that I'd been recommended to read by a few people. Books on like the God Code by Greg Braden and all these kind of books that were very much on my radar. And I instantly knew that this was a synchronistic sign that the universe, or whatever you choose to call higher power, was bringing this gentleman. We had attracted this person into our life. And before Steve went back to his, he actually stayed at the top of the property in an rv. And then the cabin at the back was where the Airbnb guest stayed, which is where we were staying. So before he went off to the, to the top of the property, back where he was going to stay Amanda's friend and shout out to him, so, hey Steve, if you ever want to come down and have a chat later on, would love you to join us. And he kind of obliged and said, yeah, I feel like we would get along really well. And then, couple of long stories short, we ended up, I ended up having conversations with Steve. Up until 2, 3am by the fire. We were chatting and chatting about all kinds of things and I just, I was just blown about. Blown away by some of the similarities between me and Steve and what we were kind of researching and passionate about. And I was captivated by Steve's story and how he built this whole property by himself and chose to leave the city life behind. And he now lives out there pretty much full time without any bank account, without any phone or Internet. And this I had to bring onto the podcast and actually returned back up to Nipissing about two or three weeks later with, with a couple more friends and sat down and I want, I really wanted to do an interview with Steve. So I'm super happy to share it. This one because he's such a great, great guy and so much we can learn from him and yeah, enjoy the. Enjoy the episode. Enjoy the interview.

Welcome to the State Shifters Podcast, a show dedicated to helping you discover your true potential through connecting the mind, body and soul.

What did you have for breakfast this morning, Steve? Steve Clements, welcome to the Stay Shifters podcast, mate. It's an absolute pleasure to have you with me.

Thank you.

We only met here three weeks ago when my girlfriend booked an Airbnb and I wasn't sure what to expect when I came out here. It's totally. It's off grid. It's about four hours away from Toronto.

Correct.

And when I got here and I met you straight away, I had a first impression that I knew, I knew I've met a special man here. And you took us down to your cabin, which was about 100 meters away from your RV setup, and it's where your Airbnb guests stay. And when I arrived at this cabin, I was absolutely blown away. Not by how amazingly comfortable it felt was because you built it yourself and made. So, Steve, can you explain to us how you came about the plan of building a cabin in the woods off grid with no electricity?

Sure, yeah. No, and again, thanks for doing this. I appreciate it. I am really far removed and I don't get an opportunity to talk to smart people. And again, likewise, when I met you, I really, really appreciate it. I listened to the words that you said and I think that they have a lot of meaning. So anyhow, my story goes that basically my son was born. I was a capitalist in a previous life. I enjoyed investing. I owned multiple businesses. I loved the hustle and bustle, and I liked the idea of cash flow and balance sheets and the whole idea of accumulating things. My Son was born and basically overnight I had sort of been gobsmacked or a paradigm shift really, or an awakening, some people call it an awakening. It's just something where I realized now. And I don't know if it was a protectionist type instinct that set in, but it was definitely something that I changed rapidly. And I felt that the environment now that I'm raising my child in, I now started to see sort of all of the pitfalls and some of the things that made me concerned about bringing him into this world. And that's where I started to become extremely overwhelmed. Started with food, food source first and, and then as you start researching our food source, it starts to open doors to a whole multitude of other problems that I found going into the corporations, how the corporations control all of our supply system. And that's where I felt now a cognitive dissonance where I was profiting or making money off of these corporations that mismanage and basically are, in my opinion, raping the world. And no father in their right mind can continue to invest in or make a living off of fucking up their child's future and their grandchild's future. So I decided that it was time to make a change. And I've been definitely interested in gardening and farming for a long time. My grandmother raised me and I just love plants, I love growing things. And I wanted to have a large property that was in a safe spot. I wanted to have clean water, a good supply of wood. I like building. And I found a location that was, like you said, about four hours away from the Toronto center. And I started building, I dug a well and I started building and I just wanted to build something small because I didn't want to again exceed my, my carbon footprint. But I did want to do it with my hands as well because I wanted to have intention in my space. And I think that people miss that too. Like it's a big thing where the pride and joy you can get from actually building your own house or abode. And there's all different kinds of, of techniques out there where people who think they're not qualified, believe me, you're more than qualified. If a bird can make a nest, a human being can make a house.

I like that.

So anyhow, I made, made my, my little micro cabin. I put it off grid. And I have a system that just basically gives me exactly what I need, no more. And I have a life that some people find difficult, but I like to carry water and I like to chop wood. So for me it's fitting you can sit and have a coffee on the front porch and you can just watch nature. So that's basically the story.

Yeah, mate. It definitely inspired me and captivated me when I first heard it. And I want to go back to after Nate, your son was born. Was there a build up to you then taking that big leap? Because we spoke about the leap of faith and people who listen to this podcast know about my leap of faith, which was moving out here to Canada, leaving my corporate job. I think your leap of faith is. It's big because you've actually had to leave on a very normal life and come out and live honestly the complete opposite of how normal most people live. Run me through that process because I think that's one thing people struggle with, is the action. Like you can talk about it, then to take the action and actually do it. I want to know what was that like? Was it something that was just you dive straight in or you prepared for this? I know you bought $12,000 worth of books. Explain that process to people, your leap of faith.

As I was running through the process again after my son was born and realizing that there was a lot of different areas to look at, I had to, you know, I can't. I can't eat the elephant all at once. I have to take one bite. So systematically working through it, obviously the purchasing of the books came from. As I was liquidating my investments, I wanted to use my profits for good use. So that's where we can call that my university education. I'm sorry, mom and Dad, I didn't actually go to university, but I'm really, really trying to educate myself like I did. So that's one of the steps. And then it was basically the realization that as I was preparing, I liked. I subscribed to Off Grid magazines, Mother Earth News, and being in a cognitive dissonance at the time, knowing that I'm not in the right life right now, wanting to move to a more natural life, and I'm educating myself by, by getting these magazines and researching on the Internet. I was really excited when my magazine came, but I was really disappointed when I finished reading the magazine. Like, I was almost in a. In a depressed state. And I thought about it after a while and I realized it's because I'm reading about people who are doing all the things that I know that I should be doing. Which again, I'll also add too, I'm that guy who knows that when you're on your deathbed and you look back, you're gonna regret the things that you didn't do more than the things that you did do. And I didn't want to be one of those shoulda, woulda, coulda's. So it was that realization that I wasn't taking that action step. And for the people out there, that was probably the most scary thing ever. It was that action step of not only can I do it, is this possible, but also what is the perception, how am I going to be perceived by those around me, friends, family and like, it seems like an insane endeavor like to say to somebody, yeah, I'm living or moving out into the middle of the bush and I'm going to have no, no power, no running water. They look at you like you're crazy. And that's the again trying to defend a position or try to get people to realize that it's not really that insane. I mean only 100 years ago people had very subsistent amenities. It was just within the last 80 years that we went through this massive technological boom. We went from an agrarian society to a super high tech society and people are really trying to keep up with it. It goes very fast and that in itself creates a lot of stress that people don't realize.

Yeah, man. I guess it comes to mind straight away. One of the things that I was so interested in the first time I met you, this is actually the second time I've stayed at Steve's place. I've got my good friend Josh Collins here from Australia with me, I've got Rebecca Lester, all previous podcast hosts, podcast guests the second time around. Those things that definitely stuck with me after I met you the first time. And I noticed that one of the things that really stood out from our first conversation was some of the initial realizations that you had after you first moved out here, and I had them as well, was how much wastage we actually, how much wastage of food, of water, of electricity that goes on in these bigger cities. And when you come out and go off grid, you realize how little we actually need to live a sufficient lifestyle. What were the biggest realizations you had in those initial days or weeks or months? Going off grid, leaving the city.

It'S probably the again, like you were saying, the speed of which you can actually build a suitable house. It goes pretty quick. When you're dealing with micro homes or a micro cabin, if you don't have a crazy amount of plumbing to put in, you don't have to string wires. It's a very basic build it, insulate it, cap it, finish it. And again, I try to explain to people that micro living doesn't mean that you have to lower your caliber of living. It actually goes up. You can get finer interior finishings for your micro cabin. You don't need much of it. You can even get ends of stock from Kijiji or these online retailers that are basically giving things away. And you can finish a space with doesn't require a lot of materials. So that was one of the first things that I realized. It was very quick. And again, the other thing too is when you're doing it yourself, you can do it leisurely as well. You can stop and sort of enjoy the day.

Like how long did it take you to build, to build your cabin, first of all?

Well, it was about three years in total.

Indy's just spotted an animal.

Do you reckon on guard? Yeah, I think it's something that she sees. He's there anyhow, we're fine. Sorry.

The question again was just the key, the key realizations you had in those initial, you know, days, weeks, months.

It was, it was the simplistic nature of again, the having to stop to make sure that I have enough wood to make a fire to cook my food. After the day, when I simply want to clean myself, I have a solar shower, which means I have to plan a little bit ahead. I have to make sure that I put my solar bag out filled in the morning. And again you have to pump the water by hand, which you know very well. Jordan came and tried pumping some water and did a great job.

Blew me away. It's 300 foot down that you dug.

I had a company, I had a special company come in. But it was a specific requirement that I wanted the well of very, very specific depth. So just the way that I know that we are sitting on a humongous sand bed or a sand vein. And also the aquifer that we are on is renowned. We have a lot of springs on the property, which means our water pressure sits very high to the surface. So the amount of water that I have in that casing is phenomenal. It's phenomenal again for being able to. Well, when you want to have gardens and livestock, it's something where you want to make sure that water being the main resource, you don't want to run out of that. So it was just one of those things where again, money has to be put into some things. And it was those things that I decided to spend a little bit of extra money on. And again, it's just one of those forward thinking things. So back to the realizations again. Was preparing. Preparing food takes a little bit longer because there's more involved. I mean, most people can go and just flip a switch and their oven comes on, they put whatever in at a preset temperature. And I mean, as you saw all of our cooking over the fire these last couple of days, there's no, there's no thermostatic control. It's basically find the areas of the coals that are good. And so it's learning those skills and understanding that pre planning, understanding that things are going to take a little bit longer and trying to fit that into your day while you're trying to again, build your. Build your own sustainable future.

It's powerful. That extra step of planning that's required when you're out here alone without a lot of the things that we take for granted. I just, I found that to be a very, a very interesting thought because the simple act of thinking something and planning and pontificating something is something so little people do at home. We don't plan enough things out. So that's a cool realization to have.

And I think that that's because we're very. And this is again where it was one of those things that I realized that I myself, I was losing time for thinking about important things because I was busy doing urgent things. It was always fighting fires. And that's where again, it's sort of like the trade off of people think that the security blanket of what society and these close amenities provide them is actually creating them more stress. The more choices you have, the more distractions you have, the less time you have. Unless you're very good at multitasking and having, you know, multi, you know, multiple compartments of your brain running simultaneously, which most people, again, they don't do that. They don't have that skill. And this is where again, it's something where we lose ourselves because we're hustle and bustle. And then the day comes to the end and you're exhausted because you were busy doing somebody else's shit and when you should be, now it's your time, but you're now exhausted. You don't want to put time into mind. Feed the books, the books that you read, the quotes that you know, these things take time to put in. You have to fit that into your day somewhere. And people, they busy themselves to death.

Yeah, there was an interesting statistic, or was it a study? I think they did and they found. You say it was a Kellogg study.

Oh, the Kellogg's corporation.

Do you mind sharing that with us?

Yeah, it was one of the books that I was reading, I wish that I could give reference to it. I can, I can get it for you.

Yeah, I'll get, I'll link it up.

The gist of it is the Kellogg's corporation, I believe in the 70s wanted to try to increase the production or productivity of their, of their corporation. So they did a study to see if they could, if they can increase a worker's happiness, they believe the worker will be more productive. So what they started to do was play with numbers of how many days off. Like giving the employees more days off is going to make the employee happier. So when they come to work, they're going to be more productive. But the funny thing is they found that the more time they gave employees off, the employees became more unhappy when they came to work. And the result of the study was that as an employee or person has time, they start to do things called hobbies and they find enjoyment in life. So then when they go back to work, it's like they don't want to be there. They don't want to be there. It's like a Monday times 10 because they had more time off, more time to get engrossed in something and now they got to rip themselves away for it and go to this dreaded job.

Yeah.

So I believe the magic number that Kellogg's came up with was 42 hours a week would be enough to keep an employee disengaged and would not give them enough time to find a passion or a hobby, therefore their job. And again, when you, when you listen to the radio stations, their entire morning broadcast is all based on making workers feel good about going to work. It's all based on. All right guys, it's Monday, we got five days to go. And they.

Wednesday hump day.

Halfway to the week, man, they make you feel good about going to work and everything is about going to work.

Yeah. So, I mean that was powerful because I was thinking about that as well when I was at, at my previous corporate job and when I first started as a, as a graduate, obviously the workloads a lot less as a graduate. So obviously as you work your way up the corporate ladder, more hours in a work week, more expectations of your work. And I was working as a grad, so I hadn't, I didn't, I definitely didn't have my 42 hour work week yet. But I was on my way there and having that extra spare time. Like I wouldn't walk out the office at five without failing and I'd go home and work on the Things that I was passionate about, curiosities, play sport, whatever it was. And I found that was actually fueling my work day. So I made sure that every single morning I made time to meditate, to journal, to do yoga, to eat healthy foods, plan out my lunches. I made sure.

Did you write it down? Is this. And again, like something again, where the. Anybody listening? I'm telling you, you probably know the power of just write it down, manifest it, Correct?

Yeah, I did. I journaled every morning, wrote my goals down, wrote my intentions. I can't wait to go back and look at those journals to see you've got them all ticked off. Yeah, but it was that act of like using those spare hours that I didn't yet have to fully invest into my work day to then reinvest them into the areas of my life where I was passionate, I was curious. And as those passions and curiosities grew, obviously the time came when I knew I was ready to leave the corporate job. When I was just getting to the point where they were asking me to stay back and work more hours, take on new responsibilities which would have kept me at my work until 6, 7 o' clock at night, which would have required me to be at my job earlier in the morning. And I'm seeing it happen now to people who are still in these corporate jobs, they get home and they're too tired to work on things they care about, they're too tired to go to the gym, they just want to crash and watch TV because I feel like they've had a long day at work. So that study, I think that's powerful. And for you to realize that, to step away from that and be like, no, no, I'm in control of where my hours go and leads me back to the self sufficiency thing. Like why do you think it's so important for people to take interest in being self sufficient or just taking interest in planning out their day and making sure they actually do the things they want first before doing someone else's to do list.

Oh, again, I think, well we, we had a conversation the other day where we were talking about discipline and we're very, very willing to let ourselves down. Remember the conversation. So again, if you, if you have the desire to work out every day and it's just you, are you going to have the discipline to wake up and work out every day? Some days you'll probably say, nah, today doesn't feel right. So you basically let yourself down. But if you had a mate or a friend that you said that hey, I'm meeting you at the gym at X and X o'. Clock. You will make, you'll get your ass there. You won't let your friend down, but for some reason you'll let yourself down. So again, it's the psychology behind it. And that's the funny thing too about the, the workforce. Like this is something where I don't know many people who are excited to go to their job every day yet they, they do it. And I don't know if it's something where, and this is where it's. I don't know if I just got something different than other people, but it was. We have a choice. And this is where people say no, I have this debt and I have that debt. And I'm like, yeah, I had debt too, but I had then or made the choice to make this my main focus. And again, intention focus. What am I going to focus on? Back to our, what we were saying before, too distracted fighting fires. How do you have time to focus on these important things when you're too busy doing the urgent things? So again, we'll bring that back. So we'll call that full circle there. So sustainable living, why is that a good idea? Well, first of all, I think it's a responsibility. I mean being dependent on somebody or something else, that's pretty freaking lazy. And again, if something goes bad, can you honestly blame somebody else? No, that's really your fault because you knew that this, I mean again we were talking about the power out. The large power outage in 2003 was a big eye opener for me. I had no idea how much of my life depended on freaking juice coming in from that grid.

Yeah man, explain. Explain to people back. Cuz I'm from Australia and I didn't, didn't know about that.

So those crazy time. Yeah, I know it was something where the, the whole eastern northeastern part of United States and all into parts of Canada. There was some problem at a switching station and actually just disrupted in a massive part of the grid. And it lasted some places was five hours up to I think three or four days and people lost their shit. Yeah, yeah they did again. Fridges thawing, traffic lights out, computers down, the cell phone grid became overwhelmed because people were making emergency phone calls. But there was some neat things that came with that as you did actually see humans banning together. People were out handing out bottles of water, giving people place of refuge, just come and stay. People were actually out. Pedestrians were out in the middle of the intersections directing traffic because there wasn't enough Cops to do it, pedestrians were doing it. So it was kind of cool to see that we actually can get our shit together. We think that we depend on all these services.

Yeah.

But we do actually come together and. But anyhow, that situation made me realize that we depend a lot on, on a certain, these, this infrastructure which is flawed. I'm telling you, man, it's an old infrastructure. Whether it's at the hydro or the logistics transportation chain, people have very little idea what little it would take to disrupt our supply chain. The 2008 credit crisis, that fucks shit up. Yeah, if you don't have money to pay the bill, a truck isn't going to deliver goods. And that's basically what was happening is money froze up. People didn't realize how big it was. Nobody lent anymore. People work on, on credit and the banks weren't giving any more credit. So companies couldn't ship food that goes to our grocery stores. They didn't get it. So things like that is. It is our responsibility to have somewhat of a knowledge of how to have the basic understanding of not just the basic requirements. Food, shelter, heat, water, camping. Basically if you go camping, you know the beauty of just keeping it simple and you got the bases covered. But again, it takes a little bit longer. Building the fire, setting up the tent, making sure you're warm if it rains again, those are the things you want your shelter, you want your overhead, basic amenities. And people are dependent on debt, credit. They're a paycheck away from bankruptcy. They don't, they don't own much, Everything is in hock. They don't know how to garden, they don't know how to raise their own food. So again, if there's a problem in the system, people wouldn't know how to cope very well. And that concerned me too, especially being stuck in a city center during a crisis. So there was a lot of reasons to just sort of think of, think of a different solution.

Yeah, it got me thinking as well. It's like how, like how dependent I am on these, these basic things like tap running with water, food in the fridge, you know, buy food from supermarkets. And it got me thinking like the power outage was out for four days. I think there's only a couple more days left until. Yeah, shit starts getting serious. And then.

That's right.

And then it got me thinking, how many people could keep themselves alive in that scenario? And I could put my hand up and say, I'm not one of them. Which is what inspired me by what you did. Because I think, man, People, if shit went south, you'd be. A lot of people be coming out here to be around you.

Well, again, it's. It's. Well, definitely. But it's something where I think that, like you said before, it's. It's interesting to see how people, they just, they. They keep on going without asking that question or thinking about sort of what is my impact. And you're talking about, you know, the. Even the. I felt guilty after a while when I would turn a tap on or flip a switch because I knew. I knew where. Again, like, what it takes.

Yeah.

What it takes to take a barrel of oil out of the ground. What it takes to sort of clean and filter and pump water to city centers. I mean, again, even the chemicals now in this, in our water system is crazy to think that people just turn a tap and they bathe in it. They cook their food in it. So just, again, if there was just a multitude of reasons why I thought not just for like a safety sakes or prepping, but that, again, minimize your carbon footprint.

The environmental impact is also another. Another.

Oh, it's crazy.

Yeah.

But also to the benefit of the. A new connection. Pulling or disconnecting the umbilical cord from society gives you a phenomenal feeling of independence and freedom. And that, too, is something where I think a lot of people don't get the satisfaction from working a job. They come home and they feel no true satisfaction because they didn't. They did nothing tangible at the end of the day was just sort of a cog, a cog in the wheel. And I think that that diminishes our ability to be happy being connected to nature again. You know the saying, when I don't have WI fi, I feel more connected.

Yeah.

And that's exactly what it is.

And people.

And again, people will freak out. The idea of not having connection to WI fi already. Like the way that when you forget your cell phone, you're driving down the street and you realized you left your cell phone at home. It was like the feeling of losing your wallet. You get this panic inside and your heart starts beating faster. It's a cell phone, man. We. We lived a long time in the past without them. Like, we can make it a day. We can do it a day.

Yeah. And I like that. I like the thinking around that because I realized it straight away when I came out here and I put the phone away and I put the technologies away and the reliance on so many things and came back out to nature. And I got that feeling again. And I must Admit that's been one of the things I've struggled with a lot. Moving out to a big city like Toronto, coming from a smaller town in Perth or a city in Perth where I kind of had nature kind of very close at all times. I could go to the beach 15 minutes away, you know, I could go out and escape the city. It was a very small city. We had just, just over a million people. Toronto's close to 5 million. So it's very, it was very different. It was a big step up to be in a busy city.

Did you feel like you're, you're, you're surrounded by more people, but you're kind of a little bit more lonely? There's that weird. Wow, there's so many people around me, but I don't feel connected.

And I mean, it ties back into the next question I'm going to ask because the lifestyle was very different in a busier city. And yes, there was more people around, but I was struggling with, with this sort of connection that I have being out here, being in, in nature. And I want to get your opinion on how, how do people who maybe live in big cities, busy cities like Toronto or Sydney, where Josh is from, how do they, how do they get this? How do we, if they can't necessarily go off grid for a weekend or a week, what, what type of things do you suggest that we can integrate into city living to replicate this, this sort of effect that we're getting now?

Well, I did, I did urban farming for a while. That was kind of fun. And they're becoming a little bit more relaxed on the regulations of having some chickens in your backyard. But again, a lot of people live in apartments or pads, which again, there's container gardening. If you have a balcony, you can start with just planting a few plants. A tomato plant in a container on your balcony is still a beautiful thing.

Sure.

Makes, makes a sandwich, makes a sandwich taste pretty yummy. But to try to get a little bit more connection to nature, people have to realize, like, especially Ontario, our backyard is with the, the amount of things that there are to do in Ontario, the national parks or the, the provincial parks that we have, yes, are beautiful. And there's so much crown land that you can, that you can go to. So it's out there. It's really out there. I think that again, it just, it depends on the person's desire or their choices. Do they want to go and find it? You don't have to go and travel to, you know, a tropical location to sort of get away from things. Again. Our backyard has a ton of things to do and see. We have the most amount of lakes. We have trails and the kayaking and rapids and rock climbing. There's biking, There's. It goes on and on and on. But again, it's. Do people have time for it? If they're desiring it and they'll make time again, there's a booking. Costco 1001 things to do in Ontario.

Really?

Absolutely. Man.

That doesn't surprise me.

I mean, 1001 and they're all. They're not chintzy little things. They're really, really cool places that, again, people have no idea how neat their own backyard is. But I guess it just requires the desire or the curiosity to go and explore it.

Exactly. I really like that answer, Steve, because it doesn't matter where you live. There's always opportunities to go out and explore. And if the desire is there to reconnect with nature, then you'll find a way. And there's like, Ontario is one of the. I've realized there is so much to do and explore here.

Absolutely.

And same as. Yeah, same as the same as Sydney, same as anywhere else. So if the desire is there, then people.

Have you ever heard of rail. Rail riding before?

No. You might have touched on it last time.

There's decommissioned rail lines where they don't run trains on them anymore, but the tracks still exist. And these are in the most pristine areas. So they design, like, people make these cool, do it yourself hybridized bikes where you put new wheels on that have like a wider steel thing that fits in the one track, and then it has a bar that comes out to the side with another wheel on it to the lateral track. And it is so smooth. Because train tracks are basically on a flat plane, but they're also away from all the roads. They're in the coolest forests. They're super silent. And people get these. You can actually get these online, these maps of these decommissioned railways.

Really?

I'm not joking.

So people go out there and actually.

Yeah, you can backpack it. You can even get the little trailers. You make a little trailer for it. So you can pack supplies, sleeping bag, and you can camp along the way. Because there's like, think about the amount of train bridges that they have on these waterways where you can't get to by roads. But there's this cool decommissioned rail line, and it's flat and easy to ride, man.

It's like, mate, that's. That's cool.

Yeah, I thought that was pretty fun. I'd like to look into that.

There's one way. Add that to the list if you're looking for a way.

Bucket list. Yeah, for sure. That's bucket list stuff. Unless you hear that train whistle coming.

You'Re like, oh, that applied to me. Yeah, I think, yeah, it's a great answer. And if people want to do find connection with nature, then look up, look up things like that. Airbnb is another great thing that's really made this more accessible to people. I mean, you.

I couldn't believe it.

Yeah. You've only just put this up on Airbnb.

In July, July 15, I started and may I. I've had a lot of really interesting conversations with a lot of really interesting people of different walks of life. Different, different gender, different ethnicity. And I'm telling you, man, the insightful that I've heard. And again, maybe it's unlucky, like, because obviously it takes a special person to, you know, see this micro cabin off grid, an Airbnb, you get a few pictures. But I mean, again, you don't get the of. Again, like you said, you're pretty far back in the bush, legit. So it takes a special person to sort of want to come out here. And I think that that's what's given me the unique opportunity to, again, like, how we met. I just, I couldn't believe it. I'm like, I can't believe.

It was amazing. Yeah, Synchronicities, you know, like, that's a part of it. You know, you're going to. The energy that you're putting out through this.

It's so funny. I was just going to say, well, that's. I mean, what intrigued me about you is when I heard what you do, your, your vocation or occupation, energy healing and what you do for Soul seven. This is something where, again, I was like, I couldn't believe it. And. And the funny thing too is a week earlier, while I was at the. I told you about the chip stand. So I was at a local little chip stand, a little chip wagon in a little cottage just around the corner. And I was sitting there by myself, just eating my little French fries, and a van pulls up and I hear them talking and I'm like, it's Australian accent. I'm like, so I'm listening and they're doing their thing. And it was husband and wife, their daughter who was 30 years old, and their aunt and uncle who lived in that area. And they were here visiting their aunt and uncle. So they order their fries and mother or the adults are ordering their Fries. The, the girl comes over, name's Monica. And she sits down, she's like, well, I guess I'll just sit and talk to you. So she literally just comes over and literally sits down with this Australian accent. She's like, oh, I guess I'll just come and sit down, talk to you. And I'm like, okay. And she's like, so do you live around here? And I'm like, yeah, I live sort of around the corner on a, on the Alsace. And I, I live in a. And she's like, oh, what do you do? And I'm like, well, I'm kind of in a sustainable project right now. I'm, I do some rentals on, on Airbnb, but I live in a little micro off grid cabin. And she's like, you're joking. She's like, I'm traveling around Canada doing a documentary on alternative lifestyles. And I was like, so anyhow, her parents come over and her aunt and uncle come over and they sit there and we start talking and they notice that I'm barefoot. And they start asking about, well, you know, did you ever wear shoes? And I'm like, no, as much as, or as little as possible. And then they started saying, so do you know about grounding? I'm like, yeah, earthing. Grounding. I'm like, yeah, I have a. I, I, when I'm in the city, I actually sleep on a grounding blanket. So it's a special blanket that.

Yeah.

Filters out. Yeah, it's so, so anyhow, then they start talking about the mother. She's very sensitive to EMF fields. So then she starts telling me about all of these remedies that she's doing to minimize the effects of EMF on her. And I'm losing my mind because the stuff that I'm studying, which again, you can't have a conversation with a hundred people, not one would fucking know what you're talking about. And here I am out in the middle of freaking nowhere at this chip wagon, and we start talking about it. So we go on and on and on. And they're so interested, so interesting in their inquisitive nature and what I learned from me sitting there having one little plate of fries. So as we're leaving, Monica goes to me, she's like, can I come check out your place? And I look at her mom and I'm like, like, you're gonna let this happen? You're gonna let your daughter just drive off with a stranger that you meet us? Anyhow, she came and she checked the place out. And it was something where, you know, she made, she made the notes and she was very diligent about taking the information that was required and she was truly learning about it. But it was just amazing. On the synchronicity of just a couple weeks earlier, I meet an Australian and then I meet you, and then everybody is interested in these, these energy, energy healing energy field solfeggio frequencies. Again, that's not coincidence, man.

So I absolutely love that. I think that's a great. That's such a good example of, of the power of that.

It's like, again, it's, it's. I think the. Again our intentions. Put it out there, you know, and you'll find the others.

Exactly.

I was shocked as on the others from the, from the people I met coming through with the. The guests of Airbnb to meeting the random stranger at this obscure spot in this freaking remote location in northern Ontario. Who knew, right?

I mean, Aussie, us. Aussies are a rare species out in this part of the world.

Yes.

And for you to come across too, in the space of a couple of weeks. Yeah, some. And again, we're having same similar sort of conversations. So shout out to Monica if you're here. If anyone knows who Monica is, clearly we're on a similar path, so it'd be nice to meet her one day.

Yeah. Good luck on her travel. She's. She converted her van. She made it a little sleeping. Little sleeping thing. And again, she even made up this cool little sign that she put. She says, sorry if my driving is bad or something like that. I'm from Australia.

Other side of the road.

But she also had some. I'm gracious. There's something like something gratitude on it, like, anyhow, I'm visiting. I love Canada. I'm visiting. Sorry about my driver or something like that. But she, yeah, she. She outfitted her. Her little van with the little sleeping area and she left from here to go to Montreal because she wanted to try poutine in Montreal. And then she was going to the east coast of Canada and then traveling the east coast. East coast looping back around, then heading into, I think it was South America.

Yeah.

So good for her, man. 30 years old, doing it by herself again. That takes kahunas.

Definitely. Yeah. I mean, she didn't use Airbnb. She went out and just met. Spoke to someone on the side of the road.

That's right.

Takes another element of courage.

Yeah. And that's, that's the funny thing too. So.

Yeah. So I guess going back to the accessibility that things like Airbnb are now creating where there's. It's the ability to share information quicker and the ability to connect with. Find the others, as you like to say. We're able to do that now on a lot more and accessible and it's just a lot faster. So there's the power. I see social media is that power as well.

I find it more personable, personal.

Yeah, well said. That was the word.

Well, again, it's something where Internet has allowed people to connect for a long time. But again, if it's done through text or form, it's not face to face. I mean, again, it's something where I was always disappointed when we start taking away cashiers and replace them with these electronic automation things is we're losing that face to face. Again, more than half the story is told by the physiology and it's nice to even feel the energy of the person sitting beside you. You don't normally get that over the Internet, so.

Yeah, well said. Yeah. And I'm. I like the. The opportunity now to be able to put this. This, your energy out there to allow other people to. Then if they want to come connect with you now, the Airbnb link will be there.

Sure. But again, it's. Yeah, it's.

It's the sitting beautiful thing. Right.

I think it's sitting around the fire. I think it's something where the environment can spur some pretty intriguing conversation. And it's again, sitting around the fire this week with you. I cannot tell you how many intriguing conversations I've had. And that's where I think that the environment makes a difference. It allows you to sort of loosen up. And I mean, look at how Josh was hitting the golf ball, right? He was killing it. He was absolutely killing it, man. He was in the zone.

It's true. It's the coherent state, the mind, body connection that a lot of people. We speak about a lot at Soul7, but a lot of people miss. When you're kind of disconnected from yourself and you come out to nature, you get it naturally.

I think it's a. It's one of those Maslow hierarchy of needs. I think it's something that is too low on a lot of people's lists. I think that they have to reshift their priorities, make the connection or the willingness to go out and spend a little bit of time. You know, sort of like the way that a relationship requires you to always make sure you have a date night, to make sure that you don't lose that spark. Kind of the same Thing with the connection of nature, you always want. You want to have a date night with nature once in a while.

And, I mean, the spark can come in other ways. And I guess I've taught. I guess I've implemented habits which help me keep that spark that you can get from nature naturally, or you can go out and meditate and you kind of get the same effect. So it's in finding the habits that are going to keep you in coherence, keep you in that state of flow again. It's definitely a lot harder in a busy city, but I do believe if you're disciplined enough, you can implement habits, routines and rituals around your day to ensure that you stay in this. In this flow as much as possible.

Absolutely.

Yeah.

So get a host plant, too.

That definitely helps.

Get a host plant.

So I guess. I guess we've switched gears a little bit here, Steve. And I mean, I. I like the idea behind spending long periods of time alone with one's thoughts. A lot of people can't do it. And there's something you brought up to me yesterday, that there's a fundamental difference between being alone and lonely. And it was a realization that you had coming out of that, which I guess spurred this whole Airbnb and then attracting more people into your life who kind of think the similar way and feel the same. But explain how that came about when you realize the difference between being alone and lonely.

Yeah, that's actually a good question. It was at the beginning. I was very motivated. I just had this. I was excited, actually. I was, like, giddy because I was finally acting on that thing that I always wanted to do. So I'm telling you, the first. The first half, six months to a year, I guess I was so blissful that I. I wasn't even aware. I mean, again, that's where I was, just alone. And again, I thought it was great because I love being able to think uninterrupted for long periods of time. Quantification, or we used to call it in the old days, philosophy. But, yeah, I mean, again, just sit and think. Right? So that's. Yeah, I guess that. That's where after a while. And it was the being and doing cool things, Seeing the shooting stars, how clear the stars are full moons. The triumph of again completing a project. Making. Making another little this or. Or doing that. You know, even just the, you know, simple. Going to the waterfalls. There's these days where. I mean, like, today, it's just. It's perfect and I've experienced it. I just wish that I Could sort of turn and say to somebody, hey, isn't that beautiful? And I think that that's kind of my realization that it's the connection that we have with people is important. And that's where sort of alone can turn to loneliness. And it's that it is that mental thing. And a lot of people have that ability to, you know, if you're an introvert or whatever, to be by yourself. But over long periods of time, I think that that's when you really start to appreciate. Whereas before, you know, you would be annoyed by some people around you. But being away for such a long period of time, I think that you really start to gain an appreciation for connection and connectivity. But the other thing I realized is the selective nature of it. Because being connected to people who aren't like minded is that we were talking before. They're the energy vampires. It's very, very easy to. You don't even have to be in conversation. But for some reason you feel really drained after hanging around certain people. Yeah. So that you know who you hang out with and what you read. Choose them wisely. That saying comes to mind. But the being, being alone, very healthy. We should spend more time alone with our thoughts. A lot of people are afraid and they think it's not productive just sitting and thinking. But again, it helps to prioritize. But if you start to then dwell on certain things. Again, we were talking about the mind is powerful, right?

Yeah.

If you don't control it, it can sort of go. It can go south.

Really.

And that's where it was something where I was realizing that I actually like being connected to people. I am a social creature. I just found that I was getting frustrated being around a cohort of individuals that didn't understand me, didn't understand my direction. And it's exhausting trying to talk to people about something different. Especially if they have no desire to even want to understand what you're doing. So the idea of being out here and now realizing that I would like to be around like minded people is again, where Airbnb was sort of like a good fit. I came from an environment where I did rentals before, but it was sort of like a. No. No real personable relationship.

Yeah.

But now it's something where it's. It's a more select route where I find that the people who come onto the property are kind of already pre selected. They already have that beautiful conversation. I love that of again, you got.

To be a certain type of person.

Who comes in and mentions, wow, that the trees Are beautiful or listen to the wind. Yeah, those are the people that again I enjoy talking to. They will captivate me and I'll have good conversations because I don't know that first of all, I'm not going to be the only one talking, which means I'm not learning. I'll be able to listen to them like the way that you and I have had many conversations and I'm learning a ton from a 20. How old are you? 20.

24.

24. So yeah, man, again we learned. We can learn so much in a day. And again, it's take. That's why again, biographies are beautiful. Right. You can encapsulate 60 years of a person's life into a couple hour read. That's a pretty cool way of extrapolating a phenomenal amount of information. Very true and very true.

I mean I took a lot of things away from when you told me about the alone and lonely distinction and the realization that you had. And another thing was when you're in an environment where people don't understand you or you're in a workplace where people don't get who you are and, and like you said, the energy vampires come in and they start to eat away. You start to question whether am I, am I the weird one here? Like am I doing something wrong? Which at times, like I felt like that mildly at times when I was at my corporate job and I was the one doing all these strange like meditation and self connection exercises and no one else was doing that. I found that difficult. But for you that's, that's another level because you're talking about going off careers, self sustained living. I didn't come across many people that talk about those kind of things. And the distinction there that I took away was, which is, you're a great example of this is being instead of telling is being the change you want to see and not just telling people about it.

That's where again I found that you have very little merit. You're a hypocrite. If I'm flipping the same switch and turning the same faucet that they are, who am I to say your carbon footprint is too big? Yeah, again it was, it's like sort of like a, a no brainer. It's like the, you know, trying to teach a pig to sing. Yeah, can't do it and annoys the out of the pig.

It was the same thing for me. Like I took that, this, this path now where I was taking more interest in myself, gaining spirituality, talking about these, these, these topics where I Guess then I realized that I had a choice. I didn't have to be in this environment, you know, I could go and be. Live this change that I believed if I was an infinite being and I had infinite access to love and abundance already within me, then I didn't need to work a job to earn a salary at work, climb a corporate ladder chasing something that I already had. So that was a choice that I made to be, to be this change and move out here and take a different path. And by doing that, like you did, we're now attracting other people who be the same thing, we believe the same thing. And I think that's, that's what's so beautiful about this, this experience that we've shared and the people we've attracted. Josh and Rebecca here, all people who we've met along this journey that we've had, and they can, they're going to keep coming with Airbnb. They're going to keep coming to your place.

Yeah, I find too, even with, you know, all of the contacts and resources that Rebecca has, I find that that's going to, again, open up so many different doors in itself. So 100%.

Might take a quick coffee. Coffee break and love to. We'll rejoin in a few moments.

Fantastic.

Back to you soon.

But, so I, I don't have data on my phone, so I twice a day I go to my neighbors, I walk to my neighbors who I look after his dogs and he allows me to hijack his wi fi so I can set up arrangements because he, he goes down south as a firefighter. So there's a couple of days in a row so I can just set up a laptop in there and I can, I can Skype with you.

Yeah. Excellent. Yeah. Oh, that's. You heard it here first. Part two with Steve Clemens is going to be incoming very soon. So we're back, mate. I want to continue the conversation and I have a few more topics I want to talk about with you until round two. But again, I want to talk about the. One of the things you said to me when you come out here was you talked about Maslow's hierarchy of needs. And when you cover those base level needs, first and foremost, you free up a lot of time and energy to reconnect with. I call it like your uniqueness. Like what, what is it that makes each of us unique? And, and I asked you that question. I remember you. And you said, think back to when you were a child. What was, what was. The things you did that you felt free and you just Played and well.

It'S, you know, okay to start. It's. It's the. I find that why I have a pursuit or why I'm doing what I'm doing is because I have a desire for information.

Yeah.

So it was something that I didn't realize that I liked in school. And this is sort of funny thing, I. I forget who the author is, but he says my, my child was a genius until I sent him to school. And it's something where I think that we lose that childhood passion, the joie de vivre, the simple nature of going out into nature just with a stick and kind of losing yourself, wandering, you know, that's the first thing. But it's again the time to sit and read a book. A lot of people don't have. If they do read a book, it's usually a book of. I'm not going to say of a non important nature, but I think that, you know, you spend a lot of time, what I call mind feed. You're constantly on a pursuit to acquire more information because the more information you have, you can basically come up with more input, more output. Basically. You know, we were talking about that earlier. That's one thing where I found that. I think that people have found that a. That if they are educated and they have some kind of a degree, that they think that when they finish that school that learning stops. And I think that that's sad. And this is where again, I like having a hobby. And this is again like the Kellogg experiment. The more time I had, the more things I got into to the point where I have so much shit going on, I don't have enough hours in the day. I wake up every day, I'm excited because when I sit and have my coffee, I make a list. My list ends up being pretty freaking big. So it's one of those things that, you know. And also when I came out here too, I found it important that very first thing I did. I actually remember writing in my journal. The, the very first night I came up here, scared shitless. Absolutely scared shitless, man. I took this massive leap.

Yeah.

And I sat in this freaking dilapidated piece of. In my freaking. My little freaking lazy boy chair. And I start writing in my journal. I'm like, all right, I'm here. Now what? And I'm like, oh, this is not going good. And I'm like sitting there looking at this first beginning sentence and I'm like, oh. I'm like, all right, cool. You know what? I'm like, scrap the journal. I flipped the Page. And I'm like, what? What's my purpose? And that's when I'm like, this is how I should be spending my time. Not writing this. What my thoughts are right now. And I'm like, my thoughts are. They're like, look at this. I'm like, now what? So anyhow, flip the page. Now my purpose comes. I started writing first thing, wanted to read. I wanted to eke out enough time in my day to make sure that I. I can read. Very important to me. I want to master something. I love the idea of mastery of some. Something. I love shooting a bow. I don't like shooting things. I just love shooting a bow.

Yeah.

So it's something that I wrote down. I want to master a bow. I want to. I want to basically wake up and shoot 100 arrows a day. Another thing, chess. I love playing chess. I have this stupid little computer chessboard that I had since I was a camp counselor and I would teach the kids to play chess, but I would also have the ability to have this computer challenge me. I was like, I couldn't beat it. I couldn't beat it. And it bugged me. So that was. That was something where I made purpose. I made it important to come out here and have this idea of sort of how I want to strategize my day and make sure that I do the things that are important first. Like, you were talking. You wake up in the morning and you hit the. That's your stuff. I call it mind your own business, myob. But we don't. We don't mind our own business. We go and mind other people's businesses first. And then, like we said, you got left. When you do, your gas tank is empty. How much effort are you truly going to put into your. Are you at 100 effort right now? Probably not. And this is again where you'll say, not tonight. This is where you say, no, I'm too tired. And who did you jip yourself down?

It's back to the. One of the things I've thought about is what I wanted people to take away from content that I put out. The people who I'm sharing, sharing this stuff with and me, it comes back to purposeful action, you know, And I'm inspired to take purposeful action the minute I listen to you talk about these things. Because you can do this any. You don't need to go off grid to start doing that, writing down what your purpose.

Well, you said it. I mean, again, it's that action thing. And this is where, again, people they misconstrue. Information and action are two totally different things. And again, like I said, you can have a phenomenal amount of information. You can research the out of something, but if you're not acting on it and you're not putting it into action, what is it? And again, this is the beauty thing about the difference between information and doing. That's what wisdom is. Wisdom is the answer to that. Wisdom is the. Again, it's the understanding that putting information into practice, taking that step. And again, like the. The journey of a thousand miles starts with the first step. And this is where, again, people don't take that first step. They'll actually research the shit out of something and they get this thing called analysis paralysis where it now starts to become too overwhelming.

Yeah.

They look at the Too, too big, too complex, and then they shut down and they'll use that as excuse. It's too hard. It is. No. Think of a thousand reasons on why this should not be done instead of the reason why it should be done. Again. Mind. Mind's taking over. Not our friend. Not our friend.

Best friend of us. Enemies.

Yeah. Three.

But yeah, one of the things I took away from that again, about you when you first got here, instead of you flipped over and wrote like, what is my purpose? And for a lot of people, they have to do lists, like things to do in the day, but they don't have the to be list.

Going and picking up groceries and the dry cleaning and dropping kids off at karate. That, that is. That is a list. And again, it keeps you busy, it seems like. And again, like we, we like to be busy. We like to be, you know, doing things. But again, it's. What are we doing and what are the impacts of what we are doing? And again, both of those things. And again, it's two parts. We don't even freaking start with the first, let alone get to the second.

So there's the. Is the action for people. If you're listening, go write down your. What's my purpose? What, like, what impact do I want to leave on the world? Where do I. What things do I want to do to start to shape the person I want to be?

And again, just. It's. I find too. It's, you know, I. I've implemented a lot of different diet strategies in my life or a lot of different lifestyle changes. And I find the simpler. You can keep it and start slow. It's those baby steps. Because again, if you make it too complex and too overwhelming, we don't stick with it. Anthony Robbins will Tell you that. I mean, it's something where you can go to a motivational speaking course and you're all charged up for freaking 16 hours. But you wake up the next day and you do shit with that information. And again, that's where it is. Manifest it, write it down. That's a very, very good way to start and put it somewhere where you see it. And if you keep it simple, as simple as like, I want to wake up and I want to do 10 pushups. Yeah, guess what? You didn't do that yesterday. Today is a way better day then. And if you can keep that consistency, then you add something else. You add something else. Now again, you keep building up to it and it's something where you know, like the saying inside on the cabin, that excellence. It's not an act, it's a habit. We are what we repeatedly do. So again, we can have good habits and we can have bad habits, but if we focus on slowly implementing a good habit every day, every week, again, something small, whether it's just sit, read a book, play a quick game of chess, shoot a couple of arrows, do 10 push ups, go and help, help somebody. Like that's something too. Where people are so self absorbed that they don't even have the time now to give back. That's important, man. We're raising our kids in a society where that, that's community service. Help a freaking neighbor. No, not important.

That's one thing I was, I noticed while coming out here was the, the people you live around in this area, mate, they come out and help you.

Oh, the community is amazing. Absolutely. Everybody waves. Everybody waves. When you drive down the street. It's, you know, I'm lucky. It's the, the grocery store that I go to once in a while actually has a spot still where you can tie your horse up in the parking lot. There's a spot.

You ever seen one?

Oh my gosh, all the time. Oh, there's. Yeah, there's a large Amish in Mennonite community up here where at the grocery store parking lot there's horse and buggy.

That's awesome.

They have. Yeah, they go in there in the grocery stores and they're in their Mennonite gear and stuff. Again, just the kindest, most loveliest people. And they're, they're the ones, they're the craftsmen up here too. If you ever want something built really quality, they're the ones. Absolutely, man.

Yeah. And you also volunteer to help out at neighbors properties who want to need help building.

All the time. All the Time. Yeah, yeah. From clearing. Clearing snow. You know, there's some elderly people in the area and they've lost their loved ones and. And they're just sort of at that point where it's a little bit hard to manage. But then the neighbors, they rallied together. Firefighter that I look after his dogs, he has a snowplow in the front and he just goes right down his driveway and then goes right across and plows the ladies driveway across the street. So it's stuff like that. I mean, when I moved here, within a week of me being here, I had like jars of preserves, I had pies, invites to dinner. It was crazy. I'm like, where did I move to, man? I'm like, I thought that I had no neighbor. What.

When did that service element come in? Was it that something that come very naturally to you to. To selfless service. If someone needs help, it's straight away, no questions asked.

Oh, no. Yes. That's something where. I don't know. To me, that's, I guess back to Maslow's hierarchy of needs. I think that one of my. I find a massive amount of satisfaction in helping others to the point where I like being a superhero. I'll give endlessly to come in and save the day. I just like having that, you know, just sort of like that.

Oh, man.

You don't. You don't. It's called. Have you ever heard of the difference between a private victory and a public victory?

No.

Oh, this is beautiful. Again, this is something where you want to see somebody who truly loves nature walk down the street with them. There's a piece of garbage on the ground and they pick it up. You now have to wonder, did they pick it up because you were there to witness it? And if they were by themselves, would they have picked it up with nobody around to see? And that's where people don't operate in the same and the same again. When they think they're alone and nobody is walking, will they actually stop and pick that up? That's called the private victory. You don't need any acknowledgment or anybody around to give you that props and kudos, man, that pat on the back, just coming and doing that selfless act without any kind of acknowledgment. To me, that's what it's all about. And that too. That's karma. That's the. That carries on not doing an act because you're going to get props for it. So. But that's me.

Yeah, I love that. And again, it goes it doesn't require money for that. You don't need to.

Oh, that's. Man. Talking about a simple freaking high.

Yeah. Yeah.

That is a very, very simple way to feel good.

Who can I serve today? Yeah, beautiful, man. I like.

Well, again, isn't that. There's like a movie like that. Pass it forward or something. Pay it forward. That's it. When I remember being in a. In a restaurant, and I was sitting there having dinner with Jill and Nate, and we get up and go and pay, and the lady at the cash, she's like, nope, you don't have to pay. Like, what? She's like, oh, the gentleman that just left paid your bill. I'm like, what? It's like, yeah, he said that he was sitting behind you in the booth and said that he just loved. He loved the conversations that we were having. And he said that we were. We were engaged, and it was something that he really enjoyed seeing. And he paid our bill.

That's cool.

So that's the kind of thing, too, again, like, when I go to the gas pump and I pump 20 bucks, I'll put it at $19.99. I'll always leave a penny because there's always that prick that will put a penny over, and they don't have pennies anymore. So now the gas station is out. So I'll be that guy that will leave a penny.

Oh, man. Simple. Simple.

Acts like, again, it's. It's not big in the. In the grand scheme of things. It's that we called the drop in a bucket. Does it make a difference? Well, yeah, it does if it's a piece of. If it's food coloring, right?

Exactly.

It's a drop of food coloring. Now all of a sudden, it really makes a difference. And that's. And I think it's the intention, too. It's just the energy that you put out there now. I think it just makes it just. It the universe. It knows it.

Yeah.

It feels it.

Yeah. You're black. You're back in the flow.

As you correct your part again, you're. You're increasing it. It's like that bank account. Too many people are just withdrawal. They need to deposit more in the emotional bank account in themselves. And others like littering, too. Or somebody has. It's funny, I was. Neat thing where somebody is driving down the road and they're eating a candy bar and they don't want to throw the wrapper in the car because they don't want to litter their area, so they'll throw it out. The window. Not realizing that that's still their area. They still have to live on this little rock three from the sun. That's still their environment. Yet they have no problem because it's not in their face. Yeah, they don't want to throw it there, but they'll throw it out there.

Yeah.

So that's the kind of thinking too, where people just have to change.

100% agree. Yeah. So you see in the big cities as well, it's.

People think nothing of it because they.

Think the impact is not going to impact them. But correct. We are our environment. We are connected to nature.

It's called. Yeah, it's called don't. Don't shit where you eat.

I. I guess. I guess I want to shift gear a little bit because it ties back in now to. I wanted to bring up Nate and after having a son and now being the change you wanted to see and having Nate grow up now where not everyone shares or especially lives this way of life that you have. What challenges did you face when Nate was growing up? And maybe you can touch on some of his schooling and how you've chose to go about that.

Yeah, that's okay. So a couple of parts there. So the schooling. Again, my previous partner, we decided to homeschool. Nate went to school for one year, junior kindergarten. And not only did he voice that it wasn't right, we realized that it wasn't right. We came up or agreed that we were going to do homeschooling. Homeschooling turned into a form called unschooling, which is basically a lust curriculum of. Of educating where you observe kind of the. The passions of your child. And then you then kind of give them the tools or allow them the ability to sort of embellish in that without distraction.

Yeah.

And just see. See how far you can take that. Because that's where again, I feel that you learn when you're truly interested in something, don't have something crammed in your head that you're not ready for. I mean, again, that's going to be useless information.

Someone telling.

Feeling like you have or that you. That someone else thinks this is important. So that was something just. And again, unschooling is observation. It's simple observation and understanding that it's more about me. I don't want my child to grow up to be me. I want them to have their own individual personality. And it's going to come by allowing them to. To develop again. I'm here for supervision a keep them alive. Once I'm done that it's basically small nudges. I don't want to have a leash. I don't want to. To have full control of direction. All I need to do is if some sometimes going off course, give that kind little nudge to make sure that stay on path and trust. And trust. That's again, parents don't trust the ability of our children's unique genius. And we squash their genius because we impose all of our thoughts, ideas, rituals, everything. Beliefs. The beliefs, again, like, it goes on and on and on and on. So the schooling was the one thing. And then how that translated into sort of my transition to up here, I have to say that it was interesting to hear, obviously opposition from close family members, which obviously, you know, that doing something as, I wouldn't say radical as this, but definitely out of the norm, you're going to get some kind of a blowback. You're definitely going to get somebody saying what the f is going on. Right. And then obviously bringing a child into this environment too, especially under certain conditions, you know, if there's anybody that works for child services. Yeah, my child had a machete at age 5. And this was just something where we under supervision trusted that this was a tool that was. He was ready for. It was something that to make him a proficient woodsman, this is something that we had to trust. He needed this. And it was the same thing as fire. I mean, again, we trusted him with fire at an early age. Back to sort of how people perceive it. Again, it's really none of my business what they think. It's something that I determined through my research and my understanding of the world that I live in. It was important not only from his schooling and upbringing to him being up here for extended periods of time not only allows him the ability to see a different world without him having to make a full commitment. And again, through observation, I truly believe that that's how you learn a lot. And what he sees me doing up here, I don't actually have to preach. I don't have to say he can actually just see. And again, even the simple byproduct of him being around when you and I or Josh and I or Beck and I, when we talk, it's the byproduct of he listens. And let me tell you, man, kids freaking listen to everything. So I don't even have to be talking to him. And he is automatically learning and he is getting a repetitive mantra of what is important just by simply being in the room observing what my acts are. And again, my acts of helping out Neighbors. He sees that. He does that now himself. He cuts the grass for all of the. All of the old timers on the. On the street. He does not charge money. It is an act of service. It's an act of kindness. The same way as his journal. The only thing that we asked him to write was what makes him happy and what he is grateful for. That was that. That was it. That was him basically learning how to write. We got him to write a journal and those were the only things we asked him to do. We didn't make it laborious, we didn't make it a pain in the ass. But let me tell you, man, if you read some of the things kids, they love, they want to be compassionate. But again, we. We send them to places, places where this. This creativity, this. This genius, this unique individuality.

Yeah.

And again, have you ever heard the saying, I was born an original, I died a copy. There you go.

Yeah. You're giving Nate the opportunity to explore his uniqueness.

And again, I. I told him, I told him personally it would absolutely break my heart if he turned out like me. I want him to turn out like him. So. But it's tough though, as parents, you know, sometimes it's hard to not instill your beliefs in them. It's hard to sort of trust and say, okay, man, I know you got this.

It's reassuring to think that when you can raise a child and be at this level of awareness and understanding that a child is growing up around that level of energy. It upsets me when I see parents who are younger than People who are younger than me have children. And I can see that they're nowhere near ready on an emotional level. They haven't sorted their own shit out first before they're having kids. And that's the worry. The kids are around these types of people and it's not their fault. They just pick up on.

Yep. They get stuck with electronics as being their babysitter and their tutor. And that's something where too, I find it a joke. Like, this is where I love the duality of the different lives that Nate. His ability to live down south and sort of be. Have access to electronics and stuff like that. But the way that he's so able to come up and go weeks with zero electronics, zero WI fi, zero connectivity. And it's something where. Warms my heart to see that this is something where he doesn't fuss about it, he doesn't ask about it, and he completely is able to just disconnect from that without having any issues with It. And that to me is. It's one of the things I wanted. I wanted to have him be able to just not need that for entertainment, to be able to just come and sort of unwind, shift and shift into a different gear. So that was. That was really good for me. And then also, whatever path he chooses, if he decides that he wants to live a corporate or a social life and he wants to have a house with a mortgage and have a car with. With debt and have a job and work nine to five, God bless him. Have at her. If he's happy and he's having fun, no problem. But I wanted to give him an option. I wanted him to see how easy it is to live almost with nothing. So you are not a slave to a job and you can actually spend your day doing things, your passions. So I wanted to just have. I wanted to give him an option to see that this is possible. And again, what he chooses, time will tell.

Balance, mate, that you've given him, which is quite special. But again, it also reminded me back to, like, shout out to my parents if they're listening, that they gave me as much freedom and options as I could as a child growing up as well. So, yeah, it makes me grateful. Being out here around you has also made me grateful for a lot of the things that my parents instilled me because I, I hear you echoing them around Nath and just through the way you. The way you live. So that's cool. Yeah. Gratitude all around. So, unfortunately, I have to be mindful of time because we gotta take off shortly.

Yeah.

So I'll keep. Keep the questions to a couple more.

Yeah, sure. Let's do it.

Until we do a part two, which is coming. So I guess the, The. The key for me is I want people to take action. And when people listen to you or anyone else on the podcast, I want them to have some things that they can go away and implement. It's like going to a seminar of Tony Robbins. You leave inspired, but then sometimes analysis, paralysis, too much information and you don't know where to start. So what's your actionable, purposeful, actionable advice you'd leave to someone after they finish listening to this to begin to implement straight away? Small or big that you believe will.

I think the small one, first of all is breathe. Take a deep breath. We pant. We do not breathe deep anymore. We're so busy that we take very, very shallow breaths. Your meditation, you know that, that it's all about the breathing, taking in, letting out. And with the breathing you become more mindful. And I think that that's a really, really good way to start, is something very, very easy to implement. Even now. Just take a really big deep breath in and just make you. You want to change, Everybody wants to change. That's how we're designed, is we. We want to become better. So next is again, like, it's. We were talking about it simple. Just make an action plan, write it on paper, and make a promise to yourself. Make a promise to yourself because again, if it's something productive, what bad can come from it? I mean, again, like, you only have something to gain. And this is what I'm saying is like, if you're fed up, if you're. If you're frustrated, if you're tired, if you're not healthy.

It'S.

That's you. It's your choice. And this is where I'm saying is it's a beautiful. Especially in Canada and Australia, I mean, we are so freed. We have so many options. It just takes the right choice. So.

And if it means you have to get up 10 minutes earlier in the morning to start riding a lift, start asking yourself kind of questions. Yeah, me. Just.

If you think. If you think about the atrocities and the hard lives that different generations and different civilizations have lived through, again, this should be a cakewalk for us, but again, we've. We've become somehow complacent. We've become codependent. We have got the entitlement mentality. And this is stuff where we have to shake it off, folks. This is something where we have to take responsibility for ourselves and not use these stupid social memes as an excuse to not do something. Get that calendar out that has the motivational sayings on it and actually live each one. Read it and live it. Don't just read it and say, oh, cool, that's a neat one. I'm going to go and tell the workers at work around the water cooler and think I'm some kind of a philosopher. Again, that's called a hypocrite or a soap. A soapbox. You don't.

Preacher.

Yeah, a preacher. Like, this is just something where, you know, mind your own business, focus on your. And if you become better, then the people around you become better, too. Let me tell you that. That shit's infectious. It's the crab in the bucket 100. You know, they. They don't like to see people getting up and out. And they'll do everything too, to pull you back down, but you got to make sure that you stay resistant to that. And charge them. So you know what, man? You can grab that tip of the, the top of the bucket the same way I can. And you know what? Let me give you a boost, man.

I love that.

Let me give you a boost.

Absolutely love that. Yeah, Great answer, Steve. And ask my final question. And it was a question that you asked me yesterday and I wanted to reverse it back now and ask it on you because you're like, you have an amazing take for what I'm about to ask. I want to know. You asked me what the meaning of life is. That's a difficult question. I want to ask you what's your meaning of life? And how has that changed since you moved out?

Yeah, before I moved out here and before I became sort of spiritual and I was corporate, I would tell you the meaning of life is basically procreate and pass genetics on. You just want your gene to be out there in nature. You know what people would call the Darwinian, the Darwinian theory. After realizing my different connectivity and the way that I believe that I don't think that we're a big bang and this is just a random set of. Of circumstance. I believe that there is some kind of a design. It's something where I think that human beings. We were talking about a. The meaning of life to me would be a connectivity not only to your surroundings, but to your tribe. A tribe is very important to have and that find the others. And being able to have people understand you is one of the best supports out there. And it empowers you to keep moving forward. And then the next is you want to avoid monotony. You do not want to do the same thing every single day. That sucks the life out of you. That is not. That is not living. That's slowly dying. So experience to me is how you keep monotony at bay. Travel, go into a different culture. Aback India. Scary, but enlightening. What a culture shock. But how absolutely monumental was that for you? The way that it shaped you, the words that you use. And we were talking like you, you, you talked with passion and animation. As soon as that came up, you infected me. And that's where again, meeting people who have not only experienced things themselves that they can instill in you and get you ramped up, but again, making sure that you take that action step to make sure that again, we don't have to be rooted. I think that we should be a little bit more nomadic and we should see the world that we live in. I got a big ass map. I got a little tiny cabin And I got a big ass map in there and I want to try to pin a lot of pins on there. And I taught a lot of great ideas on. There is awesome, awesome ideas out there from, from networking and doing woofing and house trading and, and couch surfing. You can do so much and you can see so much of the world. And I've listened to TED talks where there's a guy who went around the world and the biggest thing I got from that was he was told by everybody where he was going to Iraq, Afghanistan, all of these places that are very, very scary. Don't go there, you'll get killed. He went, nicest people ever. Time to move on. Where are you going? Oh, I'm going here. Don't go there, they'll kill you. The mindset was exactly the same no matter where you went around the world is you can't travel because you'll get killed. I don't know if that's freaking by design or what man, but it's. Don't fall prey to that travel. Be smart, be safe, but go out and experience. Because the meaning of life is that it's connection with like minded people. And with connection is that thing where you can, you can legitimately problem solve. If we collectively get together and we can truly pinpoint a problem, we know what the problem is right now, we've talked about it. But getting people like this together who actually start having the same think and that mindset to solve problems. Don't talk about the problems, talk about solving the problems. Don't about the problems. Act on. And again, be that change if you want to. About like traffic jams. Guess what? You're sitting in there making it part of that problem, man. You're one of the cars. That's the funny joke. We and complain, but we don't realize we are part of that problem. So that's the meaning of life, man. Just chill out, breathe. Get connected with the people around you. And again, the stories we told about the documents of, of people in palliative care where they, where they talk to the people who are on their deathbeds. It's all compiled information. If you go and read some of the consistencies in that, I'll tell you one thing, not a one said I wish I worked more in my life, but every freaking one said I wish I spent more time with loved ones kids especially the people that go off to work and miss their kids growing up. That's sad.

Exactly. Well, Steve, mate, it's. I can't express how grateful I am to share the connection with you and for a second time now and bring Rebecca and Josh to two friends who got to connect with you as well and create that environment or that energy that we're able to speak openly about these things. And now.

Yeah. Thank you, man. Again, this was my. I did not expect this. This was sort of like the last thing I thought would be happening was a podcast done in the middle of the forest. Yeah, well, so thank you again.

Well mate, you said that when you experience something and you feel the passionate about a certain topic or a way of living, you vamp people up, you get people excited and that's what, that's what you do to me, mate. And I hope other people listening again.

It's like the same way. It's reciprocal.

So. So we're gonna do a part series later down the line.

I'm fantastic.

Hold my word to that. And another thing I want to keep our word to is we spoke last night about creating a retreat style event out here where we collect like minded people and host workshops and create an environment where we can absolutely stuff like this on a larger scale. And I want, I want to speak about, just, just put, put the words out there now to the world that let's make this happen because we've spoken about it now. Now it's time to take the action and put the baby steps into play. So hopefully this time next year. Year. Well, this time next year we're going to try and make this happen. So if people want to keep up to date with that, then they can follow. Follow me online at State Shifters. You're not online so I won't read out any of your social media handles but I'll link up the Airbnb and if people are in Toronto and want to escape the city for a while.

I'll definitely make myself available. Contact information again, anybody who wants to participate is something where I think it would be, would be important. It would be nice. It's something where I realize that that's one of the. It's. It's important.

Wonderful man. Brother. Thank you for being on the podcast.

And thank you brother.

Until next time.

Thanks.

There we have it, guys. I hope you enjoyed this episode. As always. If you took something away from this, it really mean a lot to me me if you were to share it with a friend or a family member. But more importantly, just leave some feedback, leave a rating or review on itunes that really goes a long way. So we look forward to seeing you again the next episode. Bye for now.