It's the last night of our earthwalk. October. Ten days deep into the wild, and eight of them rained. Rain that makes you question everything - your gear, your choices, the sanity of voluntarily sleeping on the ground when you could be in a bed somewhere warm.
Four of us made this trek. Self-selected, in a way. The kind of people who sign up for discomfort because something in us knows we need it.
We're sitting around a fire. The night before, we had a heart circle. One woman talked about her fear of going back - specifically, the fear of walking into a grocery store again. Out here in the wild, unpredictable and harsh as it is, she felt safer. Happier. The other woman lives on a homestead, as close to the old ways as you can get in 2025, and she said something similar. This wild, uncontrollable terrain felt safer than her wild home. She said she wanted society to collapse. Soon. So we could all come back to this.
Abel, the elder who was one of the organizers, listened. Let their words sit in the air with the smoke. Then he spoke, and his voice had that calm that only comes from someone who's sat with hard truths for a long time.
"People are trying to find their community," he said. "They're trying to self-select who they invite to live with them. But that's the separation. You gotta realize that you're already in community. THIS is your community. This timeline that you're in, with the people you're in, you already are in community."
I felt my organs relax when he said that. Literally felt something inside me unclench.
Because he's right.
I'm in the Sacred Valley right now. Mountains all around. A waterfall they call the Siren Waterfall that I hear every night before I sleep. I'm staying a little ways from the expat community, more in the local neighborhoods. And I don't speak much Spanish - I catch maybe 2-3 words per sentence and fill in the rest with context and hope.
But here, I've learned that I don't need fluency to feel connection.
There are a few neighbors we see almost every day now. We say "buenos días" or "buenas tardes" depending on the time. Sometimes, I offer leftovers from the fancy restaurants that most of them will never go to. They receive with this gratitude that feels almost sacred. Their kids play right outside my place. Their dogs and cats runs up and join us when we're walking to the waterfall.
And when we look at each other - really look - there's this moment. This "I see you. I got you. You got me." Kinda like from the movie Avatar. (And no, this is not a plug for the movie coming up in a few weeks)
People look at each other here. In the eyes. With curiosity. With connection. You can see their whole life in that look if you're paying attention.
Back home? We don't do that anymore. We've traded eye contact for threat assessment. We've built a society where we have everything we could want, but we're terrified. Less trust. More fear. More inequality. More separation.
I've watched people here help each other onto the collectivos - these wild, packed buses that seem to defy physics. Five times in three weeks I've seen strangers help elders or women climb aboard, checking in, laughing, connecting. I haven't seen a single person sleeping on the streets, even though the houses here are way shabbier than the poorest ones in East Vancouver or Skid Row.
But there's an energy here. Hospitality. Trust. Community.
Not because they're trying to find their tribe. Because they already know they're in it.
Abel also said something else that night. He said regardless of how much we try to get back to the older ways, the genie's already out. There's no going back. There's only transforming the now into something more healing, more holistic, more collaborative. This is similar to what I wrote in my last letter.
And it can't start with wanting society to collapse.
It has to start with recognizing we're already here. Already in it. Already in community.
Ram Dass said we're all just walking each other home. That's it. That's the whole thing.
But those of us who grew up in the West - we've had that foundational desire for connection suppressed by fear. By the story that everyone's out to get us. That we need to protect ourselves. That we need to carefully curate who gets to be in our circle.
If we want to feel loved, connected, understood...we have to learn to love, connect, and understand.
We have to stop excluding and start including.
Now, it might be easy for me to say this. After all, I'm a dude who lives in a patriarchal society. What if you're a woman? What if you're traumatized? What if trust has been weaponized against you?
All valid points, I won't tell anyone to change themselves or their boundaries. But as someone who grew up for the majority of his life illegally, in hiding, where every knock on the door was a threat, and every interaction with authority was potential deportation, I can share this:
Life lived in fear, constantly scanning for threats? It's exhausting. It's small. It's survival, not living.
Life lived in as much love as individually possible, looking for the good in each other - including ourselves? That's where the aliveness is.
We are exactly where we need to be. In this crazy-ass timeline that none of us have a manual for, we are the teachers, the elders, the lovers, the saints, and the trailblazers.
We have to initiate the way of living that we already wish existed for us.
Take the leap of faith. You're okay. Your fear is okay. And you can also trust yourself. You can trust the person next to you.
Maybe instead of leading with doubt, lead with trust.
Maybe instead of excluding to create what feels like a safe space for you, include so your own understanding of life can expand.
You're already in community. You're already whole. You're already here.
Stop trying to run. Stop trying to hide. Stop living in fear.
The neighbors greeting you every morning? Community. The stranger who held the door? Community. The barista who remembers your order? Community. The person you disagreed with online? Still community. This whole messy, beautiful, broken, healing world? Your community.
Where in your life are you excluding others - including parts of yourself?
Where in your life are you letting fear run the show?
What parts of yourself do you shun or hide?
How can you include more of this life in your own life?
The wild didn't teach me to escape. Peru didn't teach me to run.
They taught me to look people in the eye and say, "I see you."
They taught me I'm already home.
You are too.
Ish
P.S. If you're ready to stop excluding and start including - to transform your fear into the trust it takes to actually feel alive and connected - I work with a small number of men and couples who are done performing and ready to do the real work.
This isn't therapy. This isn't another course. This is initiation into your own aliveness through nature, grief, love, and purpose.
If that's calling to you, reach out. Let's talk. My next availability won't be until next year.
P.P.S. I am also running my Men's Rites retreat in Peru next year. It's a chance for you to get up close and experience some of the magic of these lands - the kind of community and connection I'm writing about here. The page is up and accepting applications. Special deal for my existing 1:1 clients.
