On Living "Counter" Culture

8:19 AM Unknown 3 Comments

In the months leading up to our departure as Fulltime RVers we had many naysayers. Most were worried about the unknown while others were just sure we'd taken leave of our senses. That's ok. Living in a counter culture way can cause people to feel uncomfortable.

I've said before that I think people get upset about the choices of others because they see them as reflecting poorly on their own life choices. This is false and comes from guilt and shame that society trains us to carry. My choices and my path are mine and not a comment on on your choices or your path. No, really.

Like I said in my article about WOHM vs SAHMs we are all really the best people when we are authentic and fulfilled. The journey we should all be on is to find that authentic self inside of us and live it OUT LOUD. Finding yours has nothing to do with what others are living.

Anyways. I did have one person who lashed out and called our lifestyle "child abuse." I think this is a term we need to stop throwing around. Like using "rape" in sports, throwing the term child abuse around belittles actual child abuse and I think reflects more on the insulter's personal problems than on the insultee's. To that person I'd like to respectfully snarkily present this:

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Don't they look sad? ha!

They are flourishing like all kids do in nature. Fishing, hiking, playing at the park and around the campfire - it's just been perfect.

I didn't realize how much I took on other peoples' negativity about us living in an RV. I spent many tears and sleepless nights on the opinions of these people. It was draining to say the least and hard to counter when we didn't have first hand experience at our chosen lifestyle.

Now that we've lived this for a while I feel like a reptile that has shed that heavy skin of negativity. Our daily life is now aligned with our inner passions and the extreme RIGHTNESS of it makes all the worry about the naysayers seem silly.

I never imagined myself as "counter culture." I'm just a regular girl from middle America. If you know me in person I'm pretty normal, right? Ok, eccentric...but normal. We're just trying to take our one life and the one childhood of our children and use it most wisely - in a way that aligns with our ethics. I don't want to tell my kids "live like this" I'd rather just live it and let them live it.

I don't think that is counter to our culture but a product of it - of the freedom to choose how we live. Calling it "counter" implies it is "against" what others ("culture") are doing.

Calling us eccentric. A hippie. "Alternative." Counter culture. It just disconnects us from each other. It makes an Us and a Them. It creates Other. I've really come to believe that "other" is the concept at the root of all violence and hate in this world. When we realize there is no "other" it is impossible to hate or do violence.

When you call yourself an Indian or a Muslim or a Christian or a European, or anything else, you are being violent. Do you see why it is violent? Because you are separating yourself from the rest of mankind. When you separate yourself by belief, by nationality, by tradition, it breeds violence. So a man who is seeking to understand violence does not belong to any country, to any religion, to any political party or partial system; he is concerned with the total understanding of mankind. ~Jiddu Krishnamurti

So, just call us The Stannard5.