The Dharma of vanlife
Nighttime view from Eddie the van.
I've stepped out of my comfort zone and taken to the road for a taste of the wandering life. New situations always bring new learnings, here's what Eddie the van has been teaching me.
What have I learnt in my first 5 weeks of Van-life?
To re-cap, especially if you are new here. I am living part-time in a little campervan while waiting for my Swedish residency. Last year I decided to go back to Sweden, I lived there previously with my wife for around 5 years. Now, thanks to Brexit, the queue to get my residency back is around 18 months long.
If you know me, you’ll know I hate having my energy obstructed! So I sold my house and moved my stuff to Sweden, then bought a van for when I have to be in the UK (which is half the time). I bought the first van I saw, without actually seeing it, and without ever having slept in a van!
I was trusting my instincts. I had a strong ‘yes’ to the idea of van life. But would it all turn out to be a terrible mistake? Here I am reporting back on lessons from the first 5 weeks.
Park up outside a friend’s house
Eddie the van has turned out to be quite the guru. Here are his 6 root teachings:
There are more important things than efficiency -
I’ve had to let go of being productive. It’s a miracle you are getting this email. Living in a van takes so much time. Converting the space from a living space to a sleeping space is a major project. As is going to the loo. Or putting together some lunch. I never realised how convenient houses are. But it’s not just an issue of time, van life is the antithesis of efficiency, the van doesn’t want me to be efficient!
Life’s too short to spend it being busy -
Eddie wants me to be, er, what is the opposite of busy? Unscheduled. The first few weeks I had so many plans, two retreats plus visits to various friends. It was lovely, but way too busy. When I’d planned this trip I’d feared having nothing to do. It turns out Eddie wants me to do nothing. Maybe that’s why he has so many windows to look out.
I have a certain status it’s often invisible to me -
Eddie is challenging my sense of ‘high status’. A few people see me in the van and think it’s wonderful, but others seem to feel sorry for me. I notice in conversations how I quickly bring up that I also have an apartment in Stockholm, I’m not just living in a van. It’s given me a tiny window onto what it’s like to be seen as ‘low status’, to be viewed with pity or suspicion.
Office with a view
There are endless opportunities to be with fear -
I felt this as soon as I picked up the van in Devon and started driving home. It’s bigger and heavier than I’m used to. Not suited to motorways, but nor to narrow lanes. Any new situation gives rise to a whole new list of fears we’ve not had to consider before. With the van, it’s the fear of someone trying to get in at night. Fear of being asked to move on. Fear of running out of wood, water, or gas. I’m also learning how fear always subsides, noticing I no longer double-check that I’ve locked the door at night!
Every life includes discomfort -
In a house, the temperature is relatively stable, but here in the van it’s boiling hot when the sun is out and freezing when it goes in. What’s happening outside happens inside. Even the rain drips in the side door. The wind keeps me awake at night and I’m woken by ducks landing on the roof in the morning. The bed is not quite long enough and is nowhere near soft enough. But lying here, I get the pleasure of listening to the birds singing and watching the clouds drift by.
Everything is unknown, certainty is an illusion -
I head off to a village, a spot on a map that might be a good park up. I almost park outside an empty shop front on the edge of the big village green but instead, park up on one of the tiny lanes crossing it. The pub turns out to be nowhere near as cosy as I’d hoped, but dinner is good and, content, I jump in the van and go to bed. When I wake up in the morning, there is already a queue outside the renowned butcher’s shop, the one I thought was empty! The queue is right where I would have been sleeping. That was a close shave.
Village green park up, before the rain.
It’s interesting to watch what I do with these moments when I am outside of my comfort zone. I have to tap into reserves of independence and resilience and let go of being safe and in control.
As I get older, I do gravitate towards the known and the comfortable, so perhaps it was time I had this new challenge!
