By: Kim Acer
I am lying wide awake, unable to sleep. It is the eve of the fourth consecutive Nor’easter that is expected to pummel the east coast in less than three weeks. The power is out across town but luckily we have a generator rumbling that heats most of the house. It’s loud hum penetrates the eerie silence of my neighborhood.
Earlier that day, I visited the ocean. Her waves were fierce and wild, relentlessly pounding the shore. Homes along the coast were destroyed by her force this year, and it was clear she wasn’t finished. Through the intensity of her waves, the earth was asking for help. It’s as if she was saying, “Uhh hey guys, can you not drill into my mountains like that, force your poison down my throat, and rape my body for your resources? I’m super fucking sick now. The only thing that will get you to pay attention to me is when I throw a tantrum. So I’m going to keep making things inconvenient for you until you start listening.”
That day I listened. Something inside me shifted when I came face to face with idea that my coastal hometown could be underwater. It forced me to look at what I was doing what with my life. I felt helpless being at the whim of circumstances outside of my control. With the power outage, I saw my heavy reliance on the grid system. A deeper part of me wanted out. I wanted to experience off-grid living in greater harmony with nature. So I did a big thing that night and booked a one-way ticket to Hawaii, leaving myself with a month’s window to prepare.
Initially, I booked the flight as a joke, knowing that I had 24 hours to cancel. I had been studying Law of Attraction and how to manifest my desires. Out of curiosity, I logged on to Expedia. I asked myself: “If I were serious about this, when is my ideal day to leave?” I knew I didn’t want to miss my brother’s graduation, so I clicked about a month into the future. The next screen brought me to all the potential flights I could be on. I saw one for $320 and thought, “Not bad.” In the next breath, I was choosing my seats and typing in my credit card number. I felt like a child on Christmas morning, wild in anticipation of the unknown. What stemmed from pure curiosity became a complete shift in my life’s path.
Alongside my pure excitement, the decision brought up a boat load of fear and self-doubt. “What are you going to do there? You don’t even know anyone. Where will you stay? What will your parents think? You’re just gonna quit your job like that? You’re supposed to be saving for an apartment. What about your career? You have to work hard to end up in paradise. Only on your honeymoon or when you’re retired are you allowed to do those sorta things.” The inner critic was LOUD and so were the outer critics. During this time, I had to trust myself and the decision deeply. I knew I had to leave. I knew there was more to life than saving up money, playing it safe, and ‘thinking about it’ or ‘waiting for tomorrow’ or ‘when I’m ready.’ I felt the greatness inside of me begging to be expressed and I desired a massive shift in reality.
After many trips to REI, several mental breakdowns, speaking my feelings despite the tremble in my voice and knots in my stomach, and lots of hard goodbyes, I was on my way across the continental United States and a large chunk of the Pacific to arrive on an island that’s 25 miles long and 33 miles wide. My destination: an off-grid farming community in the jungle.
I arrived at night after nearly 24 hours of travel. Lina, a long-term community member, scooped me at the airport and I instantly felt a sense of calm. Her presence was pure like the warm, salty air that rushed into the car as we drove. I noticed the sleepiness of the island— still largely underdeveloped by humans and brimming with natural beauty. Shadows of giant mountains stood on my left while the warm Pacific swelled to my right. I felt blanketed by nature. No tall buildings, one single-lane highway, and little towns sprinkled across the land. Pretty much everything closed by 9pm. After a while, we turned onto a dirt road with many twists and turns only to end up at a small structure buried by thicket and dimly lit by Christmas lights. This would be my home for the next 3 months.
Only a few members of the community were still awake when I rolled my big suitcase into the kitchen. Immediately, I felt an overwhelming sense of warmth and welcome. These people were happy as hell…it was a little suspect, being fresh out of a brutal New England winter and all. Since it was late, a friend let me sleep in a tent he wasn’t using. I grabbed my headlamp and followed him into the jungle to my shelter. The first night was a bit terrifying. I wasn’t accustomed to sleeping outside— and here I was on an island in the middle of nowhere, on a farm in the middle of nowhere, sleeping outside. Throughout the night, bouts of pouring rain pounded my tent with such intensity that I was genuinely concerned a flood was coming…and maybe a shark would find its way into the flood and eat me alive. Or maybe some sort of reptile would slither through the fabric of the tent and poison me. For all I knew, dinosaurs could still roam the land. I regretted all survival shows I had previously watched, as my mind spiraled into darkness.
Fortunately, my wild thoughts were tamed by the first hints of daylight in sync with the symphony of tropical birds. I unzipped my tent’s doorway, and entered a portal. My feet planted on red soil, as my eyes soaked in the dreamlike realm that enveloped me: a colorful orchard of tropical trees bearing coconuts, bananas, papayas, jackfruit, and more. What felt like a scene from a murder mystery in the jungle 12 hours prior, became heaven on earth thanks to the sun’s illumination.
The days and weeks that followed would significantly change my life. I’m back in the matrix writing this, and it’s tough to find words to accurately describe my experience. I didn’t have a roof over my head, a comfortable bed, internet, a car, or really any idea of what I was doing, and yet, I’d never felt more like myself. The stripping away of the all the modern conveniences I previously took for granted helped me to connect with myself and with others at a level I didn’t know was possible.
Several mornings a week, I woke up before sunrise to farm. The community had recently hired a new farm manager and things were beginning to blossom (literally and figuratively). We had several new restaurant clients across the island, a growing CSA membership, and a high demand for our produce.
Farming was hard physical labor and I underwent an uncomfortable adjustment period. But after a while, I noticed that my body wanted to move first thing in the morning. It felt right: being barefoot in only shorts and a sports bra, heading to work with a mason jar of coffee only a stone’s throw from my tent. I would often think to myself: “This is how everyone’s morning commute should go.”
We would farm until about noon, when the sun became fiercely strong, and then retreat to the community center to make lunch and rest our bodies. I ate lots of fresh papaya, apple bananas and hand-picked arugula. The abundance of fruits and vegetables growing around me made me feel completely taken care of. My sense of there not being enough was invalidated by proof that the earth grows things for our bodies. We are naturally provided for because we are part of nature. Current systems of civilization have clouded that truth.
When I wasn’t farming, I was exploring the island with friends, reading, writing, cooking, eating açaí bowls, or working my shaved-ice job. Life was extremely simple. Being 5,000 miles from the ‘doer’ mentality in the northeast helped me to drop the need to be anything. I felt more fulfilled after a day of farming in the dirt than I did on my college graduation day.
On clear nights, I liked to visit the garden alone. I would lay in my sleeping bag on the soft earth and gaze up at the universe and the billions of galaxies that expanded into nothingness. I felt tiny and massive at the same time…like how could my little human self with my little eyes take in something so grand? Somehow, I could feel that my little being was actually an integral piece of the larger web before my eyes. I belonged to it. I let my body melt even deeper into the earth as relief washed over me, knowing that some greater force beyond my intellectual understanding was helping to orchestrate my existence. I didn’t have to know the plan, I just had to learn how to surrender.
I completed the 3-month commitment that the farm required and was contemplating whether or not to stay for the winter. After a bad panic attack and ending up in the ER, I decided to leave the island rather abruptly. Although a big part of me wanted to remain in the community, I needed to be closer to my family to take care of my mental health.
My last moments on the farm were filled with the purest form of love I’ve ever experienced. Looking into the eyes of strangers who became family within a matter of months, tears streaming down our cheeks, hearts pressing together in long embraces, bellies full of chocolate cake, laughing and crying at the palpable realization of the impermanence of it all.
My tears continued their steady stream all the way through security and up until I boarded the plane. I met people’s gazes in my mess. I was done hiding myself. I finally learned how to be seen…and I was showing off my new power. They understood. Thousands of miles and many hours later, I was back where I started. One big circle. Graciously welcomed in by my blood family. I was in the same place and yet, I wasn’t the same. Living in nature helped me to reconnect to my light, and that is the most powerful gift I can offer the world.
