My desire to walk arose out of the realization that to answer the central question I was so interested in “How should I live?” I needed to combine intellectual processes with embodied inquiry outdoors.
Subalit, ang buhay ay mas arte kaysa sining. Napaka-subjective nito. Kailangan mo munang subukang mabuhay bago mo ito maintindihan. Kailangan mo muna itong maranasan bago mo ito maunwaan. Siguro nga hindi pansansibukuban ang mga katotohanang matatagpuan ko habang naglalakad sa kalyeng ito, subalit kung ito ang nagpapasaya sa akin, ano pang pangangatwiran ang kailangan ko bago gawin ito?
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Over the extent of my entire young life, and especially during my lowest moments, I have tried and retried to answer a single question that has always baffled me—How should I live?
And as I get older, I’m starting to realize that the question eludes an answer. I’m starting to see that its very nature is that of a guide that tells you how to walk but never when to arrive.
Pursuing this question has inspired me to write hundreds of essays and journal entries and to draw landscapes and take photographs to document and remember what I have seen.
The question has taught me that to try to discern what it means to live as a human being involves not only thinking about life but, perhaps more importantly, experiencing it and finding answers in the real world—outdoors.