When the Road You Didn’t Choose Begins to Make Sense
Updated: 2 days ago
Sometimes the seasons that appear to put our lives on hold are quietly revealing what matters most. There are seasons in life when nothing seems to be moving.
At least, not in the direction we expected.
For JR and me, this has been a period requiring an extraordinary amount of patience. We have been navigating financial uncertainty while waiting for his GIS situation to be resolved. The matter has now been escalated, giving us hope that we are finally moving closer to an answer.
We had hoped that by now we might have enough additional support to settle into a little cabin or some cozy place where we could spend the winter writing and working.
That hasn't happened.
But something else has.
We kept working anyway.
And somewhere along the way, we began discovering people.
Community.
Generosity.
Creativity.
And, perhaps strangely, a renewed sense that we may be exactly where we are supposed to be.
Finding Abundance in Unexpected Places
Recently, we began discovering community resources around us that we hadn't fully understood were there.
A Sikh gurdwara welcomed us into the tradition of langar, where a meal is shared freely with anyone who comes through the doors.
We discovered community meal programs. Food pantries. The Salvation Army, where we can have lunch and receive some groceries to help carry us a little further.
These aren't luxurious things.
But somehow, they have made this period feel richer.
There is something humbling about realizing how many people quietly give their time so another human being can eat that day.
Someone cooks.
Someone serves.
Someone washes the dishes.
Someone fills a grocery bag.
Someone donated what went inside it.
And then another person walks through the door and receives it.
No grand speech.
Just one human being helping another.
It has reminded me of something I've believed for most of my life:
Community itself can be a kind of wealth.
Spiritual, But Not Religious
JR and I are both deeply spiritual people, although neither of us considers ourselves particularly religious.
We believe there are moments in life that feels bigger than coincidence.
I have often described it as Fate.
Divinity.
The Universe.
Call it whatever language speaks to you.
JR and I have long felt that we met for a reason. Strangely, even during one of the most financially uncertain periods of our lives, I feel that conviction becoming stronger rather than weaker.
Because I've started asking myself a difficult question:
What would I have done if circumstances had been different?
If I were back in the United States and needed money, I know myself.
I would get a job.
I would do what responsible people are expected to do. I would work, bring in money, pay the bills and tell myself that the books could wait.
Paladin Studio could wait.
The films could wait.
The larger vision could wait.
I would probably tell myself:
I'll come back to it when life becomes more stable.
Except life has a funny way of making "later" last forever.
Instead, circumstances have kept me here.
Working beside JR.
Editing.
Building.
Publishing.
Developing our stories.
Creating the foundation for Paladin Studio.
Day after day, I remain tied to the work that both of us believe we were brought together to do.
And sometimes I wonder:
What if that isn't an accident?
Maybe the Detour Is the Road
I don't believe spirituality requires pretending hardship is pleasant.
There have been frightening days.
Frustrating ones.
Days when uncertainty wasn't poetic or meaningful.
It was simply uncertainty.
But optimism doesn't require denying reality. Sometimes optimism means looking directly at reality and recognizing that something good may be growing inside circumstances you would never have chosen.
That's what I feel happening now. While we've been waiting for financial stability, we've discovered another form of stability: People still take care of people.
We've encountered Sikh traditions of feeding strangers. Community organizations making sure someone has lunch. Volunteers packing groceries. People giving what they have because someone else needs it.
And instead of making me feel defeated by needing some of that help ourselves, it has made me think more deeply about what kind of society we could build if more of our institutions were designed around that principle.
What if food, shelter, elder care, education, creativity and community were approached less as isolated problems and more as parts of the same human ecosystem?
It's something I've thought about for years. I've imagined traveling later in life, volunteering at ashrams or temples and living within communities devoted to spiritual practice and service.
I've imagined creating a sacred place for elders, particularly women who may not have children or conventional families to care for them.
Not a monastery.
Not simply a retirement home.
But a community.
A place for contemplation, contribution, dignity, spiritual practice and belonging.
Interestingly, while our own resources have become smaller, my vision of what abundance means has become much more expansive.
But perhaps that shouldn't surprise me.
I've felt this kind of abundance before.
There was a time in my life when nearly everything I owned had been reduced to a motorcycle and a few backpacks. I traveled through six or seven different states with eventually only about $500 left in my bank account.
On paper, I didn't have much.
But I remember feeling richer than I ever had living in a five-bedroom house.
I had the road.
I had freedom.
I had experiences.
I had the ability to wake up and decide where I was going next.
And somehow, having less made me profoundly aware of how much I actually had.
I'm beginning to recognize some of that feeling again.
Abundance for me was never about how much space surrounded me, how many possessions I accumulated, or whether my life looked secure from the outside.
My abundance has always had more to do with freedom, purpose, experience, connection and the feeling that I am actually living my life rather than merely maintaining it.
And perhaps that's why this chapter, despite all its uncertainty, doesn't feel entirely like deprivation.
In some unexpected ways, it feels like coming home to a part of myself I already knew.
Look at What We've Built
It would be easy to measure this period by everything we don't have yet.
But lately, I've been trying to measure it differently.
What have we actually accomplished while all this uncertainty has been happening?
When I stop long enough to look, the answer surprises even me.
Our Paladin Studio newsletter is beginning to take on a life of its own.
What started as a way to share our work, our thoughts and the worlds we're building is organically evolving toward something larger.
We're beginning to imagine what it might someday become: a magazine where our stories, art, different creative universes and humanitarian missions can meet.
Our film-development work is moving forward too.
We now have one-page pitches prepared for Paladin, No Fear. No Mercy., Shangri-La and Range Rider.
And now we're tackling another enormous challenge:
Adapting No Fear. No Mercy. into a screenplay.
No Fear. No Mercy. holds a unique place in our strategy. It is an IP we are willing to let go of, if the right visionary sees what we see in it and the right agreement allows someone else to carry it forward.
With our other worlds, our hope is different.
There, we're looking toward co-production relationships and collaborators who don't simply want to acquire something we've built, but who want to help us build what comes next.
And perhaps the most important development isn't purely creative.
We are developing ADANAC toward becoming a nonprofit organization, with a mission that reaches beyond films and books.
We want the work eventually to serve people.
Those experiencing homelessness and displacement.
Orphans and young people who need someone standing behind them.
People who have survived abuse or exploitation.
Communities that need more than words about compassion.
Suddenly, these don't feel like disconnected dreams anymore.
The books.
The films.
The newsletter.
ADANAC.
The housing vision.
The communities we're encountering.
Even this difficult chapter we're living through ourselves.
They're beginning to converge.
Maybe that's part of the reason I feel so optimistic.
Not because everything has worked out.
It hasn't.
Not because we suddenly have all the financing, connections or answers we need.
We don't.
I'm optimistic because when I look backward at what two people have managed to build during a period when it sometimes felt as though life was standing still, I realize something:
We weren't standing still at all.
We were laying foundations.
Another Trilogy Finished. Another World Beginning.
And then there is JR.
While I've been building much of the publishing, development and business infrastructure around Paladin Studio, JR has continued doing what JR does best.
He writes.
He has finished the Fool's Gold Trilogy.
We didn't get the little cabin.
We didn't get the cozy writing retreat.
There wasn't some magical change in circumstances that suddenly made creating convenient.
JR kept writing anyway.
And I kept working beside him.
McDonald's became an office.
The recreation centre became another.
The van became home.
And somehow, the stories kept moving.
But JR being JR, finishing one story rarely means resting for very long.
We're already turning our attention toward what comes next.
And this one feels different.
This one feels truly special.
This isn't the first time I've helped shape creative material alongside JR.
During the revision of No Fear. No Mercy., I contributed ideas, scenes and additional layers to the evolving story. I've done similar work while revisiting other material, looking for places where characters could deepen, relationships could become more complex, or another emotional or psychological layer could emerge beneath what was already there.
Our process has gradually taught us what each of us brings to the table.
JR is the author and storyteller.
I often approach story through another doorway: psychology, character, symbolism, worldbuilding and the emotional architecture underneath everything.
But what we're beginning now takes that collaboration somewhere different.
Because this time, we are bringing pieces of my own creative universes, mythology and ideas into the material JR will be writing.
Two creative worlds are beginning to meet.
I'm bringing concepts, themes, research, mythology and pieces of worlds that have lived inside my imagination for years.
JR brings his worlds.
Then we find out what happens when they collide.
We are both extraordinarily excited.
I'm not going to tell you exactly what we're creating.
Not yet.
I'll give you only this:
It's epic.
Some stories deserve time to become themselves before the rest of the world gets to see them.
Learning to Live Differently
Living unconventionally isn't particularly new to me.
I've lived off and on in a van for the better part of the last seven or eight years. Small spaces don't bother me. I've never needed a large house or conventional surroundings to feel at home.
Even winter in a van doesn't frighten me very much. I lived in a van while working at Crystal Mountain.
What worried me was JR.
Last winter, from January through May, we rented a studio in Seattle partly because I wanted him somewhere warm, comfortable and cozy. I knew what I could handle. I didn't yet know what van life, particularly during the colder months, would be like for him.
That has been one of my biggest concerns as we've headed toward another winter.
But something interesting is happening.
JR is showing me that I don't need to worry quite as much.
He's comfortable.
He's healthy and alert. He hasn't experienced any blackouts that worried us. He still gets out during the day and walks Panda a couple of times, often for twenty or thirty minutes at a time.
And we're certainly not spending twenty-four hours confined inside the van.
Most days, we spend five or six hours working between McDonald's and the recreation centre.
We write.
I edit.
We work on Paladin.
We develop projects.
We eat, work, get warm and spend time surrounded by other people.
Then, when the workday is finished, we return to our little home on wheels.
And increasingly, that's what it feels like: home.
The winters around Vancouver and Abbotsford are also generally milder than those experienced in many other parts of Canada. That doesn't mean freezing temperatures can't happen, and we'll continue paying attention to weather and adjusting when necessary.
But the reality we're experiencing has been far less frightening than the winter I had imagined in my mind.
For me, this isn't really about learning to tolerate van life.
I've loved unconventional living for years.
It's about discovering that JR may be capable of enjoying this life with me.
That changes something.
I worry less.
We aren't trying to prove anything by being uncomfortable. If conditions become unsafe, we'll change our plans. If we need somewhere warmer, we'll find our way toward somewhere warmer, or rent a room.
But we're also no longer assuming that we need four walls and a conventional address before we're allowed to call ourselves comfortable, productive or happy.
We're discovering resources.
We're meeting people.
We're finding routines.
We're working every day.
And somewhere along the way, what I initially worried might be a difficult winter is beginning to feel more like another chapter of the adventure.
Right now, we're still creating.
Still laughing.
Still planning.
Still dreaming.
Still walking Panda.
Still moving forward.
And perhaps that's another lesson this strange period has given me:
Home doesn't always have to look the way other people expect it to look.
Sometimes home is simply the place where the people you love are safe, comfortable and still building a life together.
And right now, that's enough.
And Then, Vancouver
Once JR's GIS situation is resolved and we have some additional stability beneath us, we hope to head back towards Vancouver and begin another stage of the journey.
We want to start making connections there, including exploring possibilities around Vancouver's film community and Vancouver Film School.
But I've realized something important as I write this.
Vancouver isn't where our journey begins.
We've already begun.
The books exist.
The pitches exist.
The screenplay has begun.
The newsletter exists.
The new story is taking shape.
The vision behind ADANAC is developing.
Paladin Studio is growing.
Going to Vancouver won't suddenly make us filmmakers or creators.
It will simply put us in another environment where we can begin introducing what we've already built to other people.
Perhaps nothing comes from the first conversation.
Perhaps something extraordinary does.
We don't know.
That's the strange bargain you make with the future. And the courage it takes to lead the way.
Faith Without Certainty
Maybe that is what faith means to me.
Not believing that everything will magically work itself out.
Not waiting for the Universe to do the work for us.
JR still has to write.
I still have to edit.
We still have to build the company, develop the stories, make the calls, send the emails, introduce ourselves and keep showing up when absolutely nothing is guaranteed.
But underneath all of that is a quieter belief:
Perhaps our responsibility is to do the work while remaining open to where the road leads us.
Right now, that road has taken us through some unlikely places.
A food pantry.
The Salvation Army.
A Sikh gurdwara and a cup of chai.
A van.
Eleven published books.
A completed trilogy.
Four film pitches.
A screenplay taking shape.
A newsletter becoming something larger.
A humanitarian mission finding its structure.
Two creative universes beginning to collide.
A studio finding its direction.
And a dream that has stubbornly refused to disappear.
That may not look like success from the outside.
But from where I'm sitting, I see something else beginning to emerge.
I see community.
I see possibility.
I see purpose.
I see two people who somehow found one another and discovered that their individual stories might belong to something larger.
And despite everything that remains uncertain, I find myself increasingly optimistic.
Maybe we aren't waiting for our life to begin again.
Maybe it already has.
To all the Paladins walking a road that tests your strength, your choices, your faith, and your endurance: keep going.
Listen for the higher calling beneath the noise. Trust that even the difficult roads may carry meaning. Seek the Divine not only at the destination, but within the journey itself.
Thank you for reading. Thank you for tuning in. Thank you for sharing this path with us and for becoming part of the mission.
May your guides illuminate the road ahead, and may you awaken more deeply to the divine purpose of your creation.
Walk bravely. Give freely. Receive humbly. Live abundantly.
The Paladins
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