I started answering comments on the”Free Will” entry and it put me in the writing mood, so now I just NEED to make another blog entry.

Anyway… the road trip was great, as usual. Some highlights from the trip…

Portland:

Portland was an AWESOME city. So many great things there. The first that springs to mind is that I got to meet Rebecca Dean. She’s a really cool girl… I wish I got to spend more time with her!We went hiking in Multnomah Falls the first time we hung out, which was really great. It’s a beautiful area that  has 11 different waterfalls, and you can either see one from the very base (making the trip a half hour or so), or you can hike to the higher ones. Rebecca and I chose a 7 mile round trip hike which was pretty challenging… but INCREDIBLY rewarding.

The next time we hung out, we went to a Greek restaurant where we danced, broke plates, and ate ridiculously good food. After that we went to the Portland City Grill where we got to see a breathtaking view of Portland at night!

My favorite place in Portland, by far, was Powell’s Books. It’s a HUGE bookstore – takes up a block – with just 3500 SECTIONS of books. It’s seriously incredible. I felt like I was living a different life with every section I went to… some sections I’d delve into psychology (great book that my friend Chad recommended, btw – Mindless Eating – love it!), into palm reading, astral projection, business… whatever. It was great. I even allowed myself a guilty pleasure and read some chick lit – “Fat Is The New Pretty”, I think it was called.

I ended up at the SE Powell’s (smaller) almost every day.What else… I saw a really cool extinct volcano at Mt. Tabor, right near the place I subletted. I was walking around there for a while… started walking on a new path… and ended up catching the tail-end of a wedding. That was really special.The culture of Portland was fascinating to me. The first night I got there, I saw some guy putting food from the grocery store into his backpack. He took it all out at the register, and then put it back in when it came time to pay. That would NEVER happen in Philly… people would think he was stealing! PDX (they call Portland that because of the airport code) is really laid back.

People seemed to be pretty friendly, too. Honestly, I found L.A. to be more “surface friendly”… but the difference is that the people in Portland who want to be friendly mean it. I dug the people there a lot.One of the other things I LOVED about the city is that I felt compelled to exercise everywhere. I took yoga classes, walked all the time…The culture’s pretty active, too. People walk and bike all over.  They don’t even have cross-lights in many areas… they just trust the drivers to let them go, and the drivers do. I was taken aback when I got there and didn’t even know I was supposed to stop. Oh well… I quickly learned.What else… ahhh, I signed up for Greenpeace while I was there. Really awesome organization that donates $.90 out of every $1 to the cause.

Montana

When I went to Montana, I was planning on just sleeping and leaving. I ended up meeting a guy at my hotel though who told me about this special area inside Yellowstone that I absolutely had to see. It was an hour or so out of the way, but he promised it’d be worth it… and it was.I drove up this goooorgeous cliff (the roads seriously had brick walls next to them so you wouldn’t fall off… it was a SCARY drive), and the views were absolutely spectacular. I’m so glad I met that guy. Yellowstone’s a beautiful place… my 2nd favorite in the country, I think (next to Grand Canyon).

Minnesota

Minnesota was awesome because I got to meet up with Brian McElroy. I stayed at his place for 2 nights and we had a LOT of fun!I got to meet his mom, first of all. She’s a great lady… I didn’t think she was going to like me (she told Brian I was a “bad influence” because I like to travel all the time ), but we got along great.The first night I got there, Brian and I went to a movie… inside… THE MALL OF AMERICA!! Yes, that’s right… I got to go. Haha… I’m a little less of a shopper than I used to be, but it was still really neat to see the roller coaster inside!

The next day we went to the Minnesota State Fair. DUDE. Brian said it would be an eye opening experience and he wasn’t kidding. When you first go in, they have tons of just-born animals inside the Miracle Of Life Exhibit. We saw one birth happen in real-time. It was awesome!

(Side note: I refuse to ever count up how many times I use the word “awesome” in anything I write… I think I’d be red-faced.)

We also went on a ride that looked like a death trap (went up suuuper high, flipped you upside down, went ridiculously fast, etc.) to push ourselves out of our comfort zones. Haha… it worked.

I think my favorite part of the fair was all the crazy food they had. Chocolate covered bacon, teriyaki ostrich on a stick, fried fruit, overflowing buckets of cookies… the ingenuity was definitely there.(Can’t say I tried any of that stuff, though… was going to try the bacon but they gave you SO MUCH… I wasn’t hungry enough, especially after trying out cheese curds, walleye on a stick, Australian potatoes…)

All in all, it was a great time. It’s always a lot of fun to see Brian.

Cleveland

I stopped in Cleveland to see one of my high school best friends, Laura. She’s seriously the funniest person I’ve ever met and had me in tears pretty quickly.

We recounted all kinds of stories from when we were in high school… including the times we thought it’d be funny to leave watermelons on people’s cars… throw tomatoes at an ex boyfriend’s house… the time we got pulled over from a policeman who was only trying to get my phone number… geez, that stuff seems like so long ago. Glad I’ve progressed past the tomatoes.

Philly

I’m back in Philly now, until late September. My childhood best friend is getting married on September 26 (day after my birthday!) and I’m going to be in the wedding.

Philly has been great so far… I always love to see my mom and family… and I’ll see my friends soon.Come late September I’m going to head out to Barcelona (well, probably October 1st), hang out in Europe for 3 months, and then move to Australia for the New Year….Guess that’s it for now, will post more soon.

EDIT: I forgot a really cool part – I’ve now been to 47 states (missing Alaska, Hawaii, and Kentucky)! I’ll get ‘em soon.

When my good friend Chad emailed me to tell me one thing, and I ended up attacking him with a zillion questions about free will in response – I realized this is something I’d really love to hear more people’s thoughts about. This is incredibly fascinating to me (as I would think it would be to anyone).

What do you think about free will?

Do you think we have it, or that everything’s planned out? Or maybe a combination (the bigger picture is planned out, we have control over the small stuff)?

I found this interesting video for those of you who aren’t into metaphysical stuff…And this page is what got me thinking about it in the first place.

I do have some opinions, but I feel like posting them wouldn’t be beneficial for 3 reasons:

1. I don’t want them to affect your answer (and they’re still opinions, anyway).

2. I’m not quite sure if I’m comfortable posting my experiences here yet.

3. The people from which I based some of them might delude how they’re perceived.

Would really, really, REALLY love to hear your thoughts about this.

So it’s now Day 2 in Portland and I’m really enjoying it.Before I get to that though (which’ll probably be another post), I’ve been meaning to journal about the drive up.

(The post is kind of long, so I’m going to be writing it in copywriting-style. I’d be curious to hear if that somehow takes away from it’s authenticity for you.)

Okay, so…

The Drive Up:

The actual drive was really interesting. As I was listening to some of the songs on my iPod, they had a completely different meaning to me than they did when I took my other road trip exactly one year ago. I never would’ve anticipated that, but it was an awesome feeling. I grew a lot this year.

I got a speeding ticket on the way over. I’ve gotten out of like… 12 or so tickets, so I guess it was time to pay my dues. The weird thing is, we were having conversation before he even gave me the ticket. He was asking me about the states I visited, what I do with Internet Marketing, etc. Usually those conversations mean I get out of tickets, but I think he already committed to giving me one this time (he might have called for backup too – he thought I was transporting drugs at first) and had caught me on radar. Oh well.

So anyway, I was driving to…

The Most Awesome Sublet Ever!

As I mentioned on Twitter, I got an incredible sublet here in Portland.  I got REALLY lucky, because the lady who owns this apartment had pretty much convinced herself she wasn’t going to be subletting. She interviewed 6 people via phone before me, and she couldn’t get a good gut feeling about any of them. She’s very into energy and was super-adamant about only letting someone she felt good about sleep in her bed. It was awesome, because she used the money I paid her to fund a trip to Hawaii. She kept saying “I can’t believe I’m really going!” and now when I talk to her, she says “I still can’t believe I’m really here!”

Anyway – she’s really, really cool. She was talking about moving stuff out of her closet for me, taking down spiritual messages from her wall, etc. to make me feel comfortable… I told her a) I’m happy to see spiritual messages! and b) I’m only here for 2 weeks, there’s no need for her to do any of that. It’s her home.

The sublet’s in the heart of SE Portland and right near a lot of incredible things. It’s a great location.So I tell you all of this because…

It Leads Me To This Fascinating Conversation:

I talked with a hotel owner the day before I got here. I was telling him about the sublet owner, and he said “I guess there are some good people left in this world.”!?

That blew my mind.

He really meant it.

I don’t know… I just feel like… I think everyone I meet is a “good person”. Sure, there’s lots of flakes in L.A., but they’re still good people. And that’s not the whole “positive thinking” thing… it’s a fact. I’ve traveled cross country a few times, as you probably know – hit 40 states so far – and I’ve been positively surrounded by “good people”. What a self-limiting thought to really believe the majority of people aren’t “good”.

Now, trust me here…

I’m Not A Fan Of Those Think-Positive Books.

…and I try to stay as grounded as possible. Sure, I journal about things I’m grateful for. I try to see positives in everything and am 100% confident that everything happens for our highest good. HOWEVER, I think those books delude a lot of people for 2 reasons:

1) People separate themselves from reality with all the “I KNOW it’s going to work out!” stuff. Sure – positive thinking’s awesome and I strongly believe you shouldn’t let obstacles stop you… but you have to do the WORK to get out of obstacles. I think a lot of people stop at thinking positive and then wonder why it doesn’t work out.I was reading Life’s Golden Ticket by Brandon Burchard. It’s a cool book where a guy goes through a spiritual journey, and you can kind of identify your own progress via him. There’s one point where the main character sees a montage of scenes in his life, and he’s doing a lot of things he doesn’t like. He screams, “That’s not me! I’m not that person!”

His “guru”, I guess, for the sake of your understanding, replied, “That’s psychobabble bullshit.” His point was that it IS him. If he wanted to change those aspects of himself, so be it… but he had to first understand them and acknowledge them.Most people don’t do that.And the other reason I don’t like those books, is…

2) “We must truly know the darkness before we can truly see the light.” 

Jaime really helped me understand this. Before I moved to L.A., I intellectualized everything. I didn’t allow myself to feel pain, or anything sad really, because  I figured it was a waste of time. I didn’t allow myself to listen to sad or negative songs, and surrounded myself with all things positive.

In retrospect, I think that’s delusional. Not only is it delusional, but it’s an absolute crime. After growing more and allowing myself to get pissed off, upset, etc. about things… when I feel bliss, it feels 10x more real than anything I ever experienced before.I just think most people don’t allow themselves to open themselves up that, especially with the whole “think positive! just think positive!” movement.

Now, I’m not saying they’re poorly intentioned. Sometimes you have to deliver messages in increments. For example, with yayFOOD, I tell people about calorie cycling. I don’t tell them about eating healthy or anything – if they ask, I’ll tell them – but for now, the first step is just for them to learn about the calorie cycling. People can’t feel overwhelmed. I get it.But still…having zillions of those ‘think positive’ books on the market, in my opinion, isn’t doing people as much good as they think.

So anyway,

Back To The Conversation…

Despite the opinions I just expressed, I still think it’s crazy to feel like most people aren’t good people.I was actually talking to Justin Zimmerman about this yesterday. Like I said, I’ve traveled a lot.  I can immediately reference tons of amazing people that I’ve met.  I remember meeting a guy at a coffee shop in Seattle who took an entire day off to show me around. Or the guys I met at Laguna Beach who made me sleep over (there were locks on my door ) so I wouldn’t sleep in my car. Or even the lady who owns this sublet – she made me a zillion maps and notes and everything to make sure I had the best time possible.To feel like the majority of people aren’t “good”… I don’t know, it just really got me thinking a lot.

There’s a lot more I could blog about, but I feel like I should end it here. I’ll have to write more soon, and I’d love to hear your thoughts on the copywriting style, the “good people” comment, the positive thinking movement, and whatever else.

Just some more random stuff – reflecting back on L.A., upcoming cross country road trip, and a mention of some cool websites.

What do you guys want to hear about? Membership sites? yayFOOD? Copywriting? My travels?

I’m sure I’ll be posting more about travel, just because that’s what I love to do… but if there’s something else you want to know about, let me know. I never really made a clear purpose for this site… just kind of randomly said whatever was on my mind the entire time.

I guess I’m just wondering because it seems like everyone has a different opinion. Some people in my mastermind say I should take a more authoritative tone (which isn’t really my style)… but at the same note, I wonder if I should provide more value instead of always just babbling.It seems kind of weird to flip between getting personal and going Internet Marketing…Give me your $.02.

(And don’t tell me to have two blogs, por favor!)

Ooo, that reminds me – Jaime and I are making a travel blog for when we go through South America. Our posts from our personal blogs will redirect to that site. We did a fun photo shoot with her ridiculously talented friend, Andrea to get pictures for the blog theme. You can see them here (they’re grouped with the other photo shoot pictures).

But anyway, here’s the video: