A Blog Worth Checking Out

This is the most amazing post yet, from a truly amazing blog - check it out:

http://ryanrunseurope.blogspot.com/2009/07/days-47-48.html

This guy is an inspiration.

5 Amazing Places to Run in Australia

Right, let's just imagine for a moment, that you're taking some time out. Getting away from it all. You want to run, and you want it to be amazing. Here's 5 random places in Australia that, if strung together, make for a tremendous trip.

(Most of these routes are mostly off road, so no traffic, and nicer on the knees. None of these trails require driving to get to the start, they begin as soon as you step out the door of your accomodation. So backpackers and public transporters can run them, just as much as people with the wherewithall to hire a car).

1. Sydney's North Shore.
Start with running under the Harbour Bridge and take in views of the Opera House. Keep going, round Cremorne Point and Mosman - watch the ferries, climb over a hill all banked up with posh houses. Keep going, out to Taronga Zoo - pretend you're skirting Jurassic Park with its high electric fences, the scary animal sounds, and the significant reptile presence. Keep going, and going, and going... all the way to Balmoral Beach, or The Spit, or even out to Manly if you're hardcore enough. Running in a city does not get better than this.

2. Hobart's The Domain - Tasmania
Loops with stunning views over the city. Botanic gardens at the base. A great spot to get started in Tasmania from.

3. Bicheno - East Coast Tasmania
Stay at the funky backpackers hostel at Bicheno. Do hill training up and down Whalers Lookout, then swing round the rocky shore leaping from rock to rock. A nice trail follows the shore to the beach (fantastic blackberries to re-fuel on if you're there in season), then hit the beach and go for it. Magnificent. Don't run those rocks in the dark, you'll die. But do hang out and listen to the fairy penguins... they sound like alien monsters coming to get you.

4. Freycinet Peninsula Loop - Tasmania
I've mentioned this one before here. Stay in Coles Bay, unless you're rich and can afford the swanky accomodation at the base of the park. Bit of road running/beach running/campsite track running to begin with, then... you reach Freycinet National Park, a runner's dream. There's a well-maintained track that swings out the peninsula to Hazards Beach, then you can turn inland to cross the isthmus and suddenly you emerge onto Wineglass Bay - supposedly and believably 'one of the worlds best ten beaches'. From there it's a hard climb up to the lookout, and then a hard and fast descent back to the road you came in on. Not for the fledgling runner, probably a cool 13 miles or so...? But well worth training up for.

5. Strathan to Ocean Beach - Tasmania
Stay in the town of Strathan, and head out on the sealed road towards Ocean Beach. You don't cover many miles before the road becomes unsealed. Amazing views back over your shoulder to the mountains beyond. As you keep running, probably in total isolation, a roar builds and builds - this is Ocean Beach, its big, and its loud. And when you reach it, it'll take your breath away - assuming you've any breath left. Truely magnificent. If you got to West Tasmania without a car, then chances are the only way you'll reach this beach, is to run there. Well worth it. Just you and the kangaroos.

Oh wow, just writing that lot has made me nostalgic. Take me back... Then again, take yourself there, and let me know how you got on. Heavenly running or your money back.

Picture by Linh_rOm

Would Just One 'Great Escape' Be Enough For You?

A conversation with an occasional reader the other day, put me in my place. "What you write is all very good," he said. (Oh shucks, thanks...).

"But when are you actually going to do something about it?"

Oh. Ummm...  Is it enough to say that I'm trying?  'Very trying' would be the droll response to that one. How about: Learning? Laying the foundations? Taking the first steps?  Building capacity? (Ha! I like that one, appropriate a bit of that corporate-speak that says nothing, always a good tactic).  He has a good point. But I'll counter with a better one:

Nothing sustainable happens overnight.

I could've walked out on my job any day I chose, and still can. I've got an emergency fund in the bank, and could bugger off to New Zealand or Hawaii or Outer-bloody-Mongolia any time I like. Still might. I've got a pair of running trainers by the door, and could start jogging and keep going, right this minute.  I could, and I might, and when I do, just you watch me.

I currently have the choice to take any of those steps, and I have taken all of those steps in the past. I 've learned, through direct experience, that they're not all that drastic. I can do them, you can do them. But I've also learned that done like that, they're not necessarily sustainable.

Ditching work and going travelling is an easy thing to do.

Really it is.  But at some point, the money usually runs out. And then comes the point of coming back, cap in hand, grovelling for a job, any job, because the basic needs have to be met. That's not easy. That's rotten. What I'm aiming for isn't a one-off splurge.  I've already done that and loved it. What I'm trying to do now is create a life where the things I discovered on that splurge can be steady day-by-day realities.

There's also the fact that I don't just want to indulge myself. It's a whole lot easier to swan off to somewhere sunny and lounge on a beach (for a short while at least), than to make a difference. I've done both, and I would like to keep doing both.  But one crucial factor is:

Making a difference takes more effort.

Making a difference takes more small daily steps, and more commitment. Which is tricky to do, if you're ducking off on great-escapes and then reduced to taking any old job you can get.

I've lived the dream. Now I'm finding the way to make it sustainable for life.

What about you?  Have you already done something about your dreams?  And would just one 'great escape' be enough? 

Image by Sainaalphotography

Do We Sabotage Our Own Dreams?

I came back from my travels last year, excited. I'd had a glorious year of running and travel - a combination that rocked my world.  I couldn't wait to get stuck in to doing more of the same in my home country. Have you seen what Scotland looks like?! We may not get the weather, but oh my god, we have got the terrain for trail-running.  My head was full of dreams for all the great things I'd do, building on the things I learned while I was away.

But the running has not really taken off since my return. Its sort of limped and faltered. I've chugged out a few short runs per week, doing circuits of the park that barely meet the minimum to keep my body ticking over. Sure it's been good, its very rare for such a thing as a 'bad run' to occur. But, now that I think about it, its been a lot of years, like 10 perhaps, since I've run so little or so poorly.  My dreams, that I'd made part of my everyday life while I was away, seemed inapplicable and unobtainable back in my home country and my ordinary life.

What's that all about? Yes, I've had an injury to contend with, but that didn't happen till January. What was going on between August and December?

There was a poor adjustment to being back in 'normal life.' Let's face it, full-time work, urban living, long commutes snarled up in rush-hour traffic? They cannot compete with a life on the road, where your time is your own, the national parks have paths that lead toward heaven, the sun always shines, and the priority for each day is: where shall I run and how far do I feel like going? I got fed up and despondent about that.

I've had to hand back a certain amount of autonomy to my employer and other authorities. I've had to compromise on values that while I was away, I could live my life by. Things around travel and transport, recycling and waste, time and efficiency, functionality versus 'keeping up appearances'. This has made me feel conflicted inside.

I've also had a shift in focus, getting really into political, economic, environmental and ideological debates. I've gotten very focused on the systems that limit and crush people and their potential. I've been angered by our wage-slave society, our over-work cultures, our misplaced priorities. And I've tried to make something of the alternatives, to explore other ways of living (and making a living) so that both my own and others' futures don't need to be so restricted. I've had my ups and downs with that side of things.

I've often felt frustrated, disappointed in myself, and sabotaged since my return to the UK. I've also been getting flabby and weak. But, today I wonder...

Has it been 'society' that has sabotaged my dreams? Or has it been me?

One thing I need to remember; there's always a choice.

How Travel Can Save The Planet

A dilemma I have, and rarely address, is the contradiction between how much I love and value travel, and how much I don't want the world to be decimated by self-indulgent plane journeys.

If you haven't already, you must read Thomas L. Friedman's book Hot, Flat & Crowded (2008) - see here.  It's the book that got me seriously thinking about this topic. The book focuses on the environmental crisis, how bad it is, and what needs to be done about it. Something that made me increasingly uncomfortable as I read, was how extensively the author seems to have travelled. His book is riddled with sentences like 'At a meeting in... While presenting at a conference in... While hiking in... While visiting a conservation project in...' Sentences that seem to include all continents and most countries on the globe. These details seem incongruent.  How could somebody so knowledgeable and so inspirational about tackling climate change be so blase about what must be a truly massive carbon footprint? Is it that his global influence justifies his personal impact? Is it just like Al Gore and his Inconvenient Truth?  I wasn't sure about this.

But, he did say something very poignant, that I was sure about.  One of Friedman's main motivators in tackling environmental issues has been his travelling the world and seeing the amazing and endangered places, ecosystems, plants and animals for himself. He talks about the Amazon rainforest, and the orangutans in Indonesia... I think about the places I've been; the forests of northern Japan, the moors and mountains of the Scottish Highlands, the red heat of the Australian Outback, the palm trees and surf of Maui's beaches, and the underwater coral reefs and wonders offshore.

Being there for real, experiencing the reality of these natural wonders on a true, immediate, and sensory level - that's how I know these places are bigger than us, and far too precious to sacrifice.

With modern life being increasingly urban, man-made, and managed to meet human/economic requirements... How many people get the chance to truly experience the natural world, and from that know how important environmental issues are? Thomas L. Friedman's personal experience and connection with places has motivated his writing and his politics. My personal experience and connection with places has motivated my own small efforts in this direction.  Air travel does need increasing justification. But travel in and of itself does not.

When it comes to environmental issues and the hard choices we're going to have to make, travel might be one of the very few effective motivators for change that we have.

Image from NASA Goddard Photo and Video

Do You Learn More After 'The Big Trip', Than During It?

I read a lot of blogs where people are gearing themselves for their first big trip, to ditch the routines and expectations of ordinary unfulfilling lives and Go Travelling.  And I also follow a lot of blogs where people are out there, right now, doing it, living their dream (I'm a wee tad envious of those people, it'll be sunny where they are now).  All the focus is on making it happen, and then enjoying it.  Rightly so too.  But...

What happens after the first Big Trip?  If I think about where I'm at right now...

I started this blog at the end of a major experiment in simplified and free living. I saved some cash, packed in my job, and set off to Australia for a year's experimentation. I experimented in trying not to work, trying not to need many possessions, trying to enjoy each moment, and trying to focus on the activities and passions that naturally emerge given true freedom, time and space.  Which, for me, turned out to be running, the great outdoors, writing, creativity, and close meaningful relationships.  I did it all, loved it, made the most of it, and didn't think to blog about it till after the fact (doh!).

The experiment was a success!  I came back with a clarity, a peace and a direction that was new and thrilling. I found a confidence in myself outside the norms of society that was positive and healthy and strong. Along the way, I found blogs and books by people who also had similar principals and goals, and I followed them closely (the Hobopoet, the 4 Hour Work Week, and The Art of Non-Conformity being three of the best).

I started this blog to try and keep myself on track.  To keep experimenting, and build on the experience to integrate simplicity, creativity, and a freedom from wage-slavery fully into my life, longterm.  Great goals, eh? 

Instead, something else has happened. I went back to my full-time job, and got a nice flat with my other half, and got my car back from my brother, and found there were lots and lots of things I 'needed' and simply must buy...

And all the simplicity, freedom, time and space evaporated. My 'year out' (now there's a telling phrase, who coined and propagated that one?) was nice, but as a model for a longterm lifestyle, surely ridiculous? The words 'unrealistic, irresponsible, and juvenile' all spring to mind. I write these thoughts down, and I realise that the brainwashing of modern society is working on me. I'm letting things slip, reverting to my old pre-freedom self.

So, has my experiment actually been a total failure?

No.  I've just been redirected a bit.  Out of those travels, I  have found a new direction and passion in relation to my work. Where before I was floundering a bit, now I'm focused.  Suddenly notions of social justice, equality, health and wellbeing really fire me up. Now, I have a more independent enquiring approach to my job that I didn't have before.  Its no longer enough, somehow, to just do my job each day, as expected, as instructed, and not concern myself with the things that really might make a difference.  I now know for sure that work is good and important (though I also now realise that the way many jobs are structured gets in the way of all that).

What I'm wondering is, can I combine the two types of success? Retain freedom, autonomy, simplicity and creativity as viable principals to guide my life. But also apply them as principals that may help others? Simultaneously strive for a job, a business, or an income that works to change the fucked-up priorities of our society, and improve things for all?

Following your passion, or your bliss, isn't just about hanging out on sunny beaches (though sometimes it is!). It's also about ensuring that the principals that you care passionately about are the core of everything you do.

Maybe you learn more after The Big Trip than you do during it?

How Travelling Can Give You Super-Hero Powers

Like Hiro in the TV series Heroes, I too can travel through time and space.

As I'm typing this post, it is this winter's first snow fall in the city. Big fluffly flakes of snow are cascading down and settling on the cars and bushes and buildings outside my window. And as I sit here I get a rush, backwards in time and across thousands of miles! Suddenly I am simultaneously sitting at my window in my little house in the north of Japan 8 years ago, watching the snow fall. Something about the light, the temperature, the sense of contented isolation having come home to an empty house after a day's work, is identical. It's not just that i can 'remember' it, it's that I can feel it, vividly.

Having travelled in real time and space once, I am able to travel back there again and again for the rest of my days. All I need, is the right sensory trigger. 

That's what travelling does for you, it gives you super-hero powers.

Windows

I'm on my Christmas holidays, and today is just Monday! The whole week stretches ahead, deliciously. Out on my run this morning, I'm unfocused and ok with that. I jog along, stop and start, stroll and sprint as the fancy takes me. I take an interest in other people's front rooms - glancing in windows as I pass, and admiring their trees, lights and decorations.

It's damp, still and mild down here on the ground. No sunshine to speak of. I look up in the sky, and watch the silent course of a plane as it passes overhead. Its vapour trail is lit up by the sun, a fluffy arrow of unearthly white. It makes me smile. I love that sensation of being up above the clouds as a new day breaks. Sitting next to the window hatch, gazing out at the view: blue skies, and landscapes of clouds piled high like heaps of clotted cream, every one with silver-hued and irridescent linings. The sense of calm, the contemplation, and the anticipation of being en-route to the next big adventure.

Choked with the Cold

9.30am on a frosty Saturday morning. The sun is rising through a gap in the trees, and bathing the living room in gold. I want to be out there, jogging the ice-crusted trails down by the river. But I'm not, because I'm choked with the cold: just the walk from my desk to the kettle makes my head pound and my eyes wince, let alone the 7 miler my training schedule suggests for today. What is even more galling, is that this is my first bout of ill-health in about 18 months (hangovers withstanding). It seems to say a lot, to me at any rate.

Whilst away travelling, my health was exceptional. No colds, flu, tummy bugs or any of the other common ailments that ordinarily catch me out a few times per year. It was a fear of mine - that I'd end up coughing and sneezing through the night while staying in a 8-share dorm somewhere. How unpleasant, unfair and annoying it would be for my room-mates. Or a stint of food poisoning, while sharing a small block of communal toilet facilities! How vile that would have been for other guests. I did carry around a vague anxiety about falling ill on the other side of the world, away from the familar system of free health care taken for granted in the UK.

But, luckily, it never came to be. I enjoyed over a year of perfect health. It doesn't take a genius to see why: lots of exercise, daylight and fresh air on a daily basis. A massive reduction in negative stress. Autonomy and control over pacing and activity levels - if I felt a bit tired and rundown, I could opt to rest. If I felt buzzing with energy, I could run/hike/write/work like a fiend. Constant changes of my environment and the people around me probably boosted my immune system over time. The need for very cheap and very simple food meant a super-healthy diet of fresh fruit, veg and carbohydrates most days. Being a budget nomad was so good for me.

Now I'm back, have been for 4 months now, which seems to have been long enough for all the good contributing factors to slide away and a pesky dose of the cold to incubate. It'll be over in a day or so, it's no big deal, and I'm grateful that this is the worst health problem I have to complain about. But the compare-and-contrast is resonant. In comparison to before, life now is characterised by significantly less control and autonomy, less exercise, less exposure to daylight and fresh air, more negative stress, a less healthy diet, and less engagement in creative fullfilling activities.

Normal life is bad for my health.

Re-adjusting to Life Back Home

This always makes me both laugh and feel nostalgic. Don't know who to credit for it, its done the rounds on Facebook I don't know how many times, but whoever you are out there, thank you. This is great!

"Having trouble readjusting to life back at home now that the travelling is over? Here are 9 handy hints to help you settle back in:
1) Replace your bed with two or more bunk beds, and every night invite random people to sleep in your bedroom with you. Ensure at least one person talks in their sleep and at least two people snore like trains. Remove beds one by one as symptons improve.
2) Sleep in your sleeping bag, forgetting to wash it for months. Add some bugs in order to wake up with many unsightly bites over your arms and legs.
3) Enlist the help of a family member to set your radio alarm to go off randomly during the night, filling your room with loud talking. This works best if the station is foreign. Also have several mobiles ringing, without being answered (at least one should have the default Nokia ring). To add to the illusion, ask a friend to bring plastic bags into your room at roughly 6am and proceed to rustle them for no apparent reason for a good half hour.
4) Keep all your clothes in a rucksack. Remember to smell them before puting them on and reintroduce the use of the iron SLOWLY.
5) Buy your favourite food, and despite living at home, write your name and when you might next be leaving the house on all bags. Your food should include mainly pasta, two minute noodles, cans of food with very plain labels, apples and chocolate.
6) Ask a family member to every now and again steal an item of food, preferably the one you have most been looking forward to or the most expensive. Keep at least one item of food far too long or in a bag out in the sun.
7) Even if it's a Sunday, vacate the house by 10am, and then stand on the corner of the street looking lost. Ask the first passer-by of similar ethnic background if they have found anywhere good to go yet.
8) When sitting on public transport (the London Tube would be ideal) introduce yourself to the person sitting next to you, say which stop you got on at, where you are going, how long you have been travelling and what university you went to. If they say they are going to Morden, say you met a guy on the central line who said it was terrible and that you've heard Parsons Green is better and cheaper.
9) Stick paper in your shower so that the water comes out in just a drizzle. Adjust the hot/cold taps at regular intervals so that you are never fully satisfied with the temperature. Because of this frustration, shower infrequently.

These simple but effective instructions should help you fall back into normal society with the minimum effort."

Living The Dream: Costs

Freycinet Peninsula, Tasmania. A nice place to hang out for a few days marathon training. I put in a couple of magnificent 12 milers here, round the Hazards-Wineglass Bay loop, at the crack of dawn while most of the tourists and hikers were still fast asleep.

What a dream. But how much did it cost?

Cost:

Youth hostel accomodation/night = AU$24.

Food for a day = around AU$10, depending on what you can find on the hostel's free food shelf.

Entertainments = running (free), sun-bathing (free), reading (free book off the hostel's exchange shelf), writing/drawing (cost of a biro and a notepad - a cent or two per day), conversation with interesting people (included in price of hostel), likewise any TV viewing.

Thats AU$34 for one's day's simple but blissful living, or £14.50 in UK money! How many hours work is that? 2.5 hours on the minimum wage. Less if you're lucky enough to be able to command more cash for your labour.

Now, ok, maybe it's not as simple as that. An airflight from the UK to Australia is a hefty price (besides being desperately bad for the environment, something I'll deal with on this blog some other day). But if you work out the cost of a round the world/return ticket of approximately £1000, across 365 days... Comes out as £2.74/day! That's less than a daily commute costs just about anywhere in the UK, unless you walk to and from work.

And yeah sure, if you want to be super pernickety, there are other costs: The clothes on your back. Running trainers and shorts. Deodorant, soap, shampoo, toothbrush... etc etc. The list goes on, but not indefinitely. With a minimal kit bag of essential gear (a lot of which can be picked up for free on the road from hostels' free-shelves or other travellers moving on), the cost spreads out very cheaply over several months of travel. Probably a lot cheaper than your lifestyle at home.

It certainly cost me a fraction of my lifestyle at home, and I'm not a particularly extravagant person. For somewhere in the region of £20/day, I was able to live my dream.

Anti-Stuff

Been thinking about 'stuff' a lot lately. Cataclysmic economic difficulties across the globe have prompted all sorts of views and debate on the topic and its solution... To little ol' me, the message seems to boil down to... If you're lucky enough to still have money to spend, get out there and spend it! It's your duty to the economy - and by extension, your community, way of life, and the entire social order.

Unfortunately, this clashes big time with all the thinking, reading and living that I've been doing over the past year or so. I've been heading in a steadily anti-stuff direction all this time.

• Buying 'stuff' buggers up the environment - and for what? A brief buzz of acquisition, and then, too much junk and clutter lying round the house, and ending up in landfill.
• Having lots of 'stuff' weighs you down, mentally and physically. There's nothing like trying to backpack your way round the world, to make you get brutal on exactly what stuff is essential. I found that I'd prefer a light backpack and the ability to run for the bus/train, rather than lots of lovely clothes/laptops/gadgets/books - but an inability to lug it comfortably around with me. Plus when you've got lots of stuff, you've got to worry about how secure it is, what happens if you lose it, insuring it...
• Needing stuff means needing an ever-renewing ever-increasing money supply to buy the stuff. Which means working lots. Once I quit work I found, after a bit of an adjustment period, that I preferred having loads of time to run/read/write/paint/soak in the sun/think/hang out with friends. There's a certain level of cash that is necessary to earn - to meet the basic needs. But after that, to me, time seemed more valuable than nice gear.

I didn't work for 8 months last year. I lived off savings that I'd expected to last a maximum of 3 months. But they just seemed to stretch and stretch, as I simplified and streamlined my lifestyle and my needs. As I passed through hostels, I gradually shed clothes, books, shoes and gadgets. And in exchange, I got to train for a marathon, running 5-6 times a week, in some of the most stunning places in the world. It was heaven.

Anti-stuff. That's the way to go in every way. Except for the economy.

The Freedom Not To

Lately, I've been reading a lot of Tim Ferriss, AJ Hoge, Rolf Potts, Chris Guillebeau and similar. All guys who describe their routes to a particular pot of gold at the end of the rainbow: portable empires, 4 Hour Work Weeks, internet businesses.

They focus on how their business models have freed them to travel as much as they want, whenever they want, while still running their businesses and making their fortune... And how anyone can live the dream!

I like the dream. And there's no denying that I love to travel. But part of what I dream about, is the freedom not to have to keep wandering. I'd like the option to stay put, in a particular remote corner of the world, and build a life there. But remote corners of the world don't tend to have many jobs going...

And maybe that's going to be the key thing that saves me from a lifetime of wage slavery? I actually like my job, most of the time. Well, I love my work and I think it matters - though I could do without the bureaucracy and the corporate nonsense that comes with it. But I don't want to live here, in the city, for the rest of my days.

I want to combine the work that I care passionately about, with a place I care passionately about. 

Bliss On The Road

The heat in the Northern Territory makes me hot and bothered. Irritable, lazy, nippy. A signpost suggests a range of walks in the Kakadu National Park, all between 1km and 3km, and I drag my heels and if given the chance opt not to bother. In this heat, even 1.8km is too far...!

The mozzies infest the Cooinda campsite, so we retreat into our stinking hot van as night falls, and lie there, sweating in the nude, swiping and squashing the mosquitos that bounce along the ceiling. We are on high-alert and tense to their high-pitched whine. By sleep-time the roof, curtains and sheets are pitted with mosquito corpses and dark stains of our own blood... When we waken with the dawn, the mosquito screen over the window is seething with mozzies, all waiting to get in and gorge on us for breakfast.

The driving is easy, out here in the Northern Territory. They have long, clear, mostly straight roads, with light traffic, that is either going as slow as me or has no problem overtaking. We zip along at a comfortable 80km/hour - the excuse of fuel economy lets me drive a full 50km/hour below the speed limit with no criticism or exasperation from others. The air-con blasts, and we're comfortable - till we have to stop. As soon as the engine comes to a stand-still, thick heat fills the van.

An ice-cold beer out of the eski is my treat, when we come to a final stop at whatever campsite we decide to call home for a night or two. Cold and crisp and refreshing, and the nail in the coffin for any ideas of more driving. I love it. It goes straight to my knees, my joints generally, and I feel woozy-relaxed.

I like this hippy lifestyle. I like not having much stuff, and I could certainly still get rid of more of what I've got. I like swimming in natural swimming holes in the morning, reading my book, writing, sketching or dozing in the afternoons. I love going out for a run in the cool of the mornings before the sun burns orange through the tree canopy.

We sit about and pipedream our futures - travels through Canada, New Zealand, Chile, Ireland and on... I suddenly feel unworried. I could happily 'drop out' after all. I'd manage to find stints of work of some kind. I'm not that interested in accruing lots of the latest and bestest stuff, and that means my hard-earned cash will buy me a whole lot more travel or other simple pleasures...

I'm enjoying this lazy life, but I wouldn't want that to be all there is for the rest of my days. I'm pursuing a reduction in stress and a truer sense of freedom, but I don't want to be idle.

It's freedom to do more, not less, that I'm after.

Image by NeilsPhotography

Works Better, Not Having

I think it works better, not having. I used to buy books, and magazines, and prints of writers and artists who's work I admire. I think it's important to support the work of talented people, and its nice to have these things at home to browse. But having on the bookshelf doesn't mean 'having' in my mind - purchasing the object doesn't help me know the content of the book any better, or to internalise the beauty or technique of the artwork.

When I travel, I'm in no position to buy books of interest, or cards and images from the exhibitions I find amazing. I can't go printing off all the gems I find on the internet, and I can't pay for the time to copy things down word-for-word, or even shorthand. I'm forced to just look at the things I see that are wonderful, to read the information I want or need. Pay attention to it. Remember and absorb what I can, and then walk away. Later, I might take the time to write or sketch it out. I'm surprised at how much I remember, and it's interesting what comes out. Not exactly what I saw or read, more like something strongly-influenced but new, a creative fusion. And then ideas bubble and fizz and increase exponentially! It's magical.

When I'm in full-time employment, I rarely have the time to browse things, then let thoughts stew before writing or sketching them out. But I do have the money to buy the book. I build a great collection with little depth. For greater depth and personal creativity, it works better, not having.