Why are we all going so fast? Why are we rushing around, moving so fast we forget to feel? Everything quick, cheap, and easy comes at a cost. Patience, on the other hand, is glorious. Discipline opens new layers of joy.

I was ordering a coffee the other day and asked for it in a porcelain cup, to enjoy “in house.” The barista looked at me as though I had asked for a martini before noon. Same story when I requested a glass of water, in an actual glass, not a plastic cup. It made me wonder where so many of our small pleasures have gone. Why can’t we sit still for fifteen minutes?

Thinking is productive too. Not just doing, not just going. People often ask what I “do” in Bali. My answer is simple: I think. I observe. I expand. My occupation is the pursuit of expansive thought - how to show up fully present, how to create with intention, how to give my best to everything I touch. Travel curation is a portal, travel writing is a portal, and the entrance to the portal is presence. None of us are going to get in via throwaway cups or throwaway relationships. We’ve built an entire culture around speed and consumption, endlessly searching for the next quick hit.

Travel has fallen into the same trap. A place starts out hidden, beautiful, untouched. Then it gets pinned on a map, influencers descend, and the line forms, everyone queueing for the same photo, nobody lingers, nobody engages. Nobody sits for a slow coffee in a real cup.

Everything instant is cheap. Depth is the flex.

Mobile first? Go deep first. Try-hard first. Give your best first. Make room for creativity and connection first.

Way less urgency. No more fear of missing out. Curiosity, awareness, and time enough to let life unfold - one quiet coffee at a time.