Fifty-Three is a Prime Number – My Annual Birthday Reflection.

Fifty-Three is a Prime Number

2024 felt like my longest year yet – I’m not sure why. Time slows when you are living in the moment.

I’m not sure but maybe this was my best year yet on at least a couple of levels. I bought a house, I moved to Japan, my novel The Keys to the Riad was published, I wrote two new novels, I created a whole bunch of amazing art. I made new friends and visited with old friends. I spent the summer with my daughter – hiking, camping, biking, having fun, I brought my mom to Oahu and gave her a dream level vacation, I spent time with people I care about, I fasted, I meditated, I created and created and created. I went to Vietnam and hiked up mountains. I partied in Japan with new and old friends. I swam with manta rays on the Big Island. I hiked in the Redwoods on Thanksgiving with my sister and my daughter. I helped nice Japanese kids with their English. There was even some romance along with some absolutely hilarious dates that went completely wrong and still have me laughing. Fifty-two was a next level year – but I didn’t get to spend as much time with my daughter as I wanted which is probably okay – she wants to spend more time with her friends at this age, but as I sit here in Japan writing this, I miss her even though we text or FaceTime almost daily. It probably would have been helpful to make more money or to have a job – but it was great not having a job and I made do with the money I have and made. I took my first snowboarding lesson and I bought myself a season pass for the ski resort I live next to and went skiing for the first time in thirty years.

Japan has been very good for me. Satoshi Manor is a true blessing. I’m not sure what the future holds or if I will figure out how to make it possible to live here all the time, but I hope so. Aside from wanting to spend time with my kiddo, I have no real desire to live in the USA. I’d love to meet the right woman and fall in love, build a life together but if that doesn’t happen, I’m okay with that too. In fact, it’s kind of fun to be single right now. I’m enjoying it.

In my 53rd year – I’m going to have fun. I’ll keep creating. I’ll keep fixing myself and hopefully helping other people do the same.

Fifty-Two Pickup

2023 – By my reckoning I’m past the halfway point now.

*(Not sure why the homepage has the 51 is a new beginning – WordPress updated and I can’t seem to get rid of it.)

Birthday Eve. I always said I would live to 101 – so it seems I have 50 to go – wait a minute, only 49 because by the time this is published I’ll be 52. So I’ve been living that first year of the last fifty countdown.  This was a rough year – I’m not going to lie. Financially it was a disaster. Watching all that money in crypto and NFTs evaporate wasn’t fun. Going through the mental, emotional, and financial struggles of finalizing divorce. Not living with my kiddo and second guessing all of my life decisions. Doing everything I could to try to make it in Web3 and ultimately – having pretty much everything fail. I joined one project as a founder thinking that meant ownership but after 8 months of the equity can getting kicked down the road – found out the hard way that it was never going to happen. Not the first time I’ve done that – never again.

I put together an all-star team with Vagobond Magazine and we talked and talked and talked about creating a profitable business – but at the end of the year when it was crunch time, roughly half the team didn’t show up for the big game.  If you’re not paying people, you can’t be pissed when they flake out. Still, it feels terrible to be such a low priority when you are trying to give away equity. The other half of the team though – oh my god, completely blessed to be working alongside these rock stars. They showed up, they put in the work, they didn’t give up. I’m honored by them.  As to VM as a whole – we fulfilled the mission of two years of 9 amazing issues each (18 total), we started producing a number of podcasts together – we learned and we had fun.

It seems like years ago – but in February, I was on stage as a presenter at NFT NYC, I got to see my picture up in Times Square, I attended a private party at the NY Stock Exchange, I read a poem at a small theater off broadway poetry reading, we ran a panel with the Web3 Academic Conference – seriously that stuff all feels like it was three years ago.

The dive into NFTs and Crypto wasn’t good for me on more levels than just financial. Did it contribute to the failure of my marriage? Possibly, but honestly, that was more about the two people in the marriage than anything else. I’m so grateful to have it completed and relatively friendly as we co-parent our daughter.

I wrote a new novel ‘I, Watch‘ in 2023 (you can read my writing notes at the link) and I started producing and releasing the audio content for ‘Hasan I Sabah‘. I almost forgot that my novel ‘Notes from Nowhere‘ was published in collaboration with my artist friend Femmebot and Creatokia, a German Web3 publishing company. We gave all the revenue from it to the victims of the Maui fire that wiped out Lahaina, another event that seems like years ago.  My Web3 Writer friends and I won a collaborative writing contest on the T2 platform. In addition, I rolled out some amazing lore for the disappointing NFT project I thought I would be partial owner of. Ultimately, they wanted me to write and market mostly for love of the project – but I’ve learned my lesson in those situations. If I’m not guaranteed equity in writing, I’m not building it. So – it actually was a deeply satisfying year in terms of creativity.

I’m proud of the father I am to my daughter. She knows she is loved and I’ve tried (but of course we all fail at this sometimes) to always make decisions with her best interests in mind, not my own. You would think this would be the easiest thing in the world, but my own upbringing showed me just how impossible it can be for some folks. I feel certain that at the very least, I’ve done more good than harm – and if I’m being honest – the good side of that scale is winning by a long shot. Perhaps my proudest achievement in life is consistently putting the happiness and welfare of my child first.

I wanted to reduce the amount of stuff I have – and I did that, but there is still work to do. That 100 thing list beckons to me – but realistically – it would have to be a list with things like: tools, clothes, etc because I have more than a hundred pieces of clothes, a toolbox filled with wrenches and sockets, and a box filled with art supplies – plus five tubs filled with books. Still, a lot less than I had. I even shredded all of my lifetime worth of journals. The past is done. No need to keep dragging it around with me.

My stated goal from last year to dive deeper into meditation and to fix body, mind, and spirit was highly successful (okay, not so much the body part.) I went to a 10-day, no tech, no talk, meditation retreat and I feel like I’ve gone through a huge amount of healing past trauma this year. I’m a better person, a better friend, a better father, a better brother, a better son. In fact, I consciously reconnected with almost every person in my close family and healed all the long standing disputes or grievances (at least from my side which is all I am in control of).

Much of this has to do with honing the principles of Baldism (formerly Bald Jesusism) into a simple, functional, and very useful framework. Ultimately, it was so effective that it became clear that I needed to leave Baldism completely and so I’ve taken the work done this year and crafted it into something new and beautiful. I’m forking Baldism to create Baoism. I feel like Baoism might actually be my life’s work. It still retains a little bit of the fun and silliness of Baldism (like fun holidays) but without the angry or resentful edges that were there. Baldism, however, was so useful to me as I was (angry and resentful) – that I’m leaving it intact and available for someone else who may be in need of it just as it was.

I’m launching Baoism on December 27, 2023, my 52nd birthday. It’s my gift to me and my gift to the world. I’m really proud of it. It’s simple and beautiful and useful. I think it could really be a tool that could make people happy. I hope so.

In my 52nd year- I’m going to continue building and repairing my mind, body, and spirit. I will need to put a little more effort into the body portion this year. I didn’t gain weight in 2023, but I didn’t lose it either. Well – actually, I yo-yo’d and finished up just about where I started despite a lot of progress at other times. It’s been sort of non-stop candy since October and that obviously needs to stop.

I’d like to find a true and satisfying love this year (who wouldn’t?) and to start living some of that reality – but it’s not a requirement for my happiness – just something I’m open to and wouldn’t mind finding. I’ll keep telling stories and I’ll keep promoting Baoism as a way that people can become more happy. Also in 2024, I want to finally buy that little piece of security, a place to call my own – that I own, can work on, and can improve how I like. I’m ready, it doesn’t have to be much but it needs to be somewhere that no one can tell me to leave and that my daughter can always know she is welcome.

The Other Side of Fifty

2022 – A Great Year – Just not for markets

Fifty was a better year than most. I lived Bald Jesusism for a year and ushered in the era of Baldism with the Council of Aiea. I traveled around the world and then some…Hawaii, Texas, California, Australia, Sri Lanka, Bali Indonesia, Malaysia, Singapore, Dubai, Morocco, France, Iceland, New York, Japan – it was a hell of a travel year. I pivoted Vagobond to Vagobond Magazine and we published nine issues. Meanwhile my startup and my marriage both failed but without too much drama or trauma for anyone involved. I bought another old Vanagon and am quickly realizing I don’t want to have an old vanagon. I started running again and with some effort managed to get three miles under thirty minutes which is a far cry from where I started. I lost about twenty pounds but want to lose about twenty more. I decided that I don’t really want to be a surfer even though there is still a part of me that really does.  I’m not a Disney person but I managed to visit five separate Disneylands this year and Knott’s Berry Farm as well – all in my effort to make sure my daughter has a better childhood than I did (Disney California, Paris Disneyland, Paris Disney Studio, Tokyo Disneyland, Tokyo Disney Sea). I wrote a couple of books I’m really happy with and revised a couple of others in ways that has made me happy. I launched three NFT projects and while none of them took off or made more than a few dollars, two of them sold out as free mints (and then failed) but that’s the process to learn by. I got rid of a bunch of stuff, managed to make another year without working for anyone else, and made a whole bunch of new friends. The rise and fall of crypto and NFTs meant that I made more money than I ever have and without realizing my gains, lost more money than I ever thought I could handle – with it all said and done – I’m slightly better than break even and happy about it. That’s better than most made out this year. Realizing that storytelling is what makes me happiest was a huge plus to this year. Certainly there were challenges – emotional, physical, mental, and spiritual – but I overcame them all – at the very least I survived them all.  The fact that I celebrated this birthday dressed in a day-glow Adidas tracksuit that was issued to me for owning an NFT while exploring Disneyland Sea in Tokyo, Japan with my 11-year-old daughter speaks volumes to the kind of amazing year this was.

In my 51st year, I plan to dive deeper into meditation and fixing my body, mind, and spirit from the trauma of a half century +1 of this life. I plan to tell stories, keep writing, encourage other writers and storytellers and to bear down and learn some things about marketing and promotion. I’m doubling down on creativity and building community around it. I’m going long for collaborative storytelling and immersive world building.

Half a Century felt like a long time. My Birthday Blog Post

2021: Half a Century – That’s a good start

Birthday Eve here. 49 was a pretty good year. I launched a religion, didn’t work for anyone else, and accomplished enough of my goals that I feel pretty good. I created the Major Arcana of a tarot deck, wrote several books and learned how to work within an entirely new industry. We survived some awful trauma associated lockdowns and with what we thought was long term housing – but which wasn’t and I made art on a huge number of days, spent huge amounts of quality time with my wonderful kiddo, and felt like I succeeded beyond expectations at both dad’ing and adulting. I spent some time with old friends, made a whole bunch of new friends, and so much more.

I feel like this may have been the most productive and growth oriented year of my life. I called 2021, the year of transformation, emergence, and launch. Indeed it was and is for a few more days. I’m not sure what to call 2022, but I feel good going into it. I feel like in the last year of my 40s, I really and truly started to discover who I am and what I can do. I’m excited to start living this life – and can’t wait to see that it brings. Happy Birthday to me. If my estimation of living to 101 is right – this is almost the middle with the 2022 Summer Solstice marking the midpoint of my life. That’s pretty cool. I’m going to go with it. It’s a 5 5 5 year. (5+5) x 5 – this bodes well.

In my 50th year, my plan is to embrace and share Bald Jesusism, the religion I birthed in my 49th year. There’s a whole philosophy and happy life road map in it that I’m going to live and share. Everything from walking every day to helping others to creating to embracing the blockchain lifestyle. My life will be lived according to the tenets in the Holy Bjble (which you can read for free here or download and read for free here). Here it is – in a nutshell – my life plan for the next 51 years:

I’ll be doing commentaries on this through my podcast , my discord, and on twitter. I can tell you, I’m immensely grateful to be here today. I have so much to be grateful for. Thank you all for being part of my journey as I’ve gone around the sun one more time.

2020: 49 Years and 50 birthdays

I don’t have much to say here. 49 is a great number. Anything with a nine in it, I call good. I’m already looking forward to 50. I’d rather not look back at all, it turns out. Australia was wonderful. I feel blessedly lucky that we live in Hawaii. Having the opportunity to be a home school teacher and not send my 8-year-old into awful distance learning has been a complete joy. I wrote several new books this year and edited several others that had been waiting in the wings.

Turns out though that 48 was more about learning to exist in a cocoon than emerging from one. I didn’t buy a house or become an awesome ukulele player or a tai chi master in 2020, but did pretty amazingly on all the other goals I set for myself. I did some form of meditation and exercise on nearly half the days this year.

48 was just fine. I’m ready for 49, so hold the line.

2019: 48 years old

47 was a really rough year but like a caterpillar spinning a cocoon, avoiding getting eaten by birds, and all the other death traps. I made it into my cocoon. The chrysalis was formed. At 48, I’m emerging. On my 48th birthday, my mom and step-father called me  – which was very thoughtful of them. My sister sent me a couple of nice gifts- which was also thoughtful. I had a couple of texts and a couple of social media Happy Birthdays. My wife brought me coffee and said Happy Birthday in the morning but the most important person – my 8 year old daughter made me a card and wrote a story with the characters we’ve created and then we spent the day together ( my wife was working). It was all that mattered. My daughter did adulting with me – we went to IHOP and neither of us finished our breakfast, we paid off a bank loan, we got used tires put on the front of my car, we went to the post office, and we had Japanese ramen for lunch where she said “Daddy, if I had money, I would pay for your lunch”. I melted. It was a great birthday and I think it’s going to be a great year. As for 2019 – I’m glad to see it going into the sunset. I learned a lot, I set the stage for a better life, and I wrote a new novel, started a couple of businesses, quit working for other people, and have taken control of my life in ways that I never have before.

I’ve done pretty good in life. India and South America remain as places I want to travel – but I managed to hit Japan, Egypt, and many more since my 40th. Australia coming up. I managed to move my family to the USA, get my wife citizenship, and even manage to keep us going in very expensive Hawaii. I’m a great dad and an innovative entrepreneur. My mission is “A healthy life of joyful liberty questing for wisdom, knowledge and positive relationships with self, others, planet, and being.”

Everything that came before was just preparation for what is coming. I’m excited about the future.

2011: 40 years old

Man oh man. Hard to believe that I’m hitting 40 today. To tell the truth though, it doesn’t seem to matter very much. Age is just a random way of keeping track of things.

So far, it’s been a pretty good run. While I didn’t quite hit the mark of 40 countries by my 40th – I did reach 37 of them! Not bad.I’ve got a loving wife and a beautiful daughter so by 40, I became a family man. I even managed to get my daughter US citizenship and a passport.
I’ve written and written and written – so far without much in the way of commercial success – but a writer is a writer because they write – it’s not really a choice. It’s what we do.

Back to my 40 years of reflection. I managed to graduate from the University of Hawaii while in my 30’s with an Honors degree and a laundry list of awards and titles – that was pretty cool. In my twenties I was a US Marine, Air Traffic Controller. Thank God that’s over. I’ve been a stock broker, a house painter, a DJ, a chauffeur, a bartender, a waiter, a hotel manager, a bellboy, and worked in film – hell, I’ve even seen my name roll on the credits of a few big Hollywood films.

Most recently, in this past year, I managed to support my family, pay for my daughters birth, take care of all of our needs (house, medical, dental, utilities etc) and do some pretty cool travel (Paris, Spain, Italy, sailing in Greece, South Korea, Malaysia, Indonesia, Singapore, Switzerland, Turkey, Bulgaria, Serbia, Macedonia and here in Morocco) all with my own two fists. No boss, no job – just taking care of us with what I do. I’m proud as hell of that.

So, in a word – I feel pretty good about my accomplishments.
What do I want next? Well…let me think about it. Off the cuff –
– Get my wife a US Residency Visa
– Buy a house and property – somewhere
– Actually find some commercial success as a writer (see above to help with that :))
– I’d like to visit Egypt, Japan, India and the countries of South and Central America.
– and be able to get a really nice car before my midlife crisis hits…
Thanks for all your birthday wishes! Lordy Lordy, I’m 40.