From the Desk of Maverick Brenton.
Subject: Living a Life Worth Writing About.
Towards the end of 2022, after spending an entire year locked in a room teaching myself sales and stacking cash. I’d started to go a little insane. Had a bunch of money in the bank. A new skillset that I could use to make an online income. New doors had opened. I felt an itch, again - the itch for a new adventure. After some events which I won’t go into, I woke up one morning and decided I was leaving Australia.
I packed two bags. One is my leather writing satchel which holds my macbooks, my cigar smoking kit, my writing stuff and a few bundles of paperwork. It’s sitting next to me as I type these words. The other is a leather duffel bag which I crammed with some jeans, shirts, and basic clothing essentials. All I had outside of that was a bag of strong maduro cigars and my favorite book - “As a Man Thinketh” by James Allen.
The morning was beautiful. A warm sun was rising in the outback countryside of Australia, and I smoked a cigarette while tying down my bags to the black monster I planned to ride 1000km’s over the coming two days. She is pictured above. I was flying out of Sydney. A 12 hour drive from my hometown in the middle of nowhere. Which made it about 15 hours on the bike. I’d done my time getting back on my feet. Going from having $500 in the bank and a broken hand, to having close to six figures in cash, a new skillset, and my hand fully healed.
My friends were living it up in Bali while I was rotting away in a small mining town out in the middle of nothing. I was very comfortable. Had a nice girl. Easy life. But my heart desired a new adventure and it wouldn’t stop burning. It took a lot to tip me over the edge and muster the courage to leave the country, but it was what my gut told me to do.
So I did.
Firing up the bike and listening to it roar throughout the early morning, I hugged my mum and said goodbye like I had done many times before. Then rode out of town to sit by a small river where I smoked for a while and thought about the year past. I’d climbed out of rock bottom again and done very well. I missed my life as a deep sea diver, but this life was better. I was very grateful for the things that had happened. I was grateful for the man it made me into. As I sat in the quiet countryside puffing on a smoke and watching the river, a new sense of excitment swept over me.
It was time for the next chapter.
During the long ride to freedom I had many thoughts pass through my mind. I thought back over my time as a diver and recalled the crazy life I used to live. I remembered pulling myself down a slimy chain, into the dark depths of the ocean on a salvage job. Next to me was a kiwi guy. We didn’t look at eachother as we descended. We just looked down into the darkness as we slowly pulled ourselves deeper. Ears popping. A current pulling at us while we held onto the anchor chain. The water was cold and without mercy. A diver had been eaten by a great white shark at this very spot only some months earlier. Taken into the darkness by it.
It felt like a lifetime reaching the bottom. Then suddenly we got there, and kneeling, we looked around with our flashlights and up into the immense darkness of the ocean. 40 metres below the surface with heavy gear and face masks, trying to find something somebody had lost. It was very peaceful. Humbling. Realising the ocean’s immense power and my insignificance as I sat down there listening to nothing but my mask pumping the air which kept me alive. The ocean could take me then. I was too deep to swim up, and too heavy. If something went wrong I was dead, but knowing that was really beautiful. To be so out of control and so focused on the present moment, that all of my life slipped into tunnel vision on the job I was doing.
This was a wild life. One that changed me into a different kind of man. A man with new limits and a particular attitude towards life itself. Because when you have danced with death for a living you stop caring about the pathetic bullshit that most people care about. You gain a new perspective and appreciation for the time you have on earth. You become something else, at least I did.
Most people are afraid of everything. They are afraid to speak their mind, afraid to stand out, afraid to stand their ground, afraid to try new things, afraid to step off the beaten path and become who they want to be in this world. Timid. Shy. Bowing down before those who are no different than they are. You get what you believe you can have in this world, not what you’d like or what you want - but what you BELIEVE you can have and what you develop a genuine need for having. Otherwise it’s all just a pipedream. A fucking fairytale. An idea in your mind that never gets realised.
As a young man I used to dream of doing something great. I used to look up at the night sky and wonder at all the possibilities. My mind was free. Pure. Unscathed by life and unhindered by any limiting beliefs. When we are young most of us are like this. We dream of who we want to become; astronauts, businessmen, rockstars, somebody who is somebody in this world - because we believe we can do it. However as we grow older that fire goes out. We start listening to other people more than we listen to ourselves. We forget how to trust the guy in the mirror, and for the most part we disregard him completely.
To fit into a world that pushes back against our originality. Our independence. A world that wants to beat us into the same automatons who run it. They all think the same. They all act the same. They all live the same. White picket fences. Friendly faces. Politeness. Doing their best to step on nobody’s toes and upset anyone. Living just to please. Then all of a sudden they’re old and their best years are gone. The mid life crisis comes.
“What have I done with my life?”
Unless you can have the courage to follow your gut instinct and trust yourself, this world will beat you into submission and hammer you into a life you never wanted. Just look at most middle aged men - how many of them do you envy? Trapped under the weight of responsibility for that which does not care about them, locked into obligations and commitments they don’t want. This is what scared me as a young man. It’s what still scares me now…to fall into a life of mediocrity and comfort.
Not because there is anything wrong with what certain people do. Some guys are happy to live the lives they live. But I don’t write for them. I write for those who are not happy, and those who lost themselves along the way. Somewhere, somehow, they gave up on themselves. Ending up in a dead end life without anything that means anything to them. Numbing themselves to the pain of being lost with distractions and food and shallow pleasures. I’ve seen it before. I’ve been there myself. I was a young guy using sleep to escape my world. Watching movies and playing video games to forget. The only issue with that, is you have to come back to reality eventually. You can’t escape the truth. It’s always there staring you right in the eyes. It follows you around like a demon with it’s long black teeth in your ankle.
“WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING WITH YOUR LIFE!?”
It keeps you awake at night. Eats away at you during the day. Like it did for me. You dream of living a life worth writing about - but you don’t know how to. I can’t tell you exactly how to either, because there isn’t a two step magical process to becoming who you want to be and having a life that is what you want it to be. All I can do is tell you how I did it. Share my experiences and the process I followed to escape from the world I was in. But what I want you to understand is that there is no perfect pathway. There is no secret. There is no “Ah hah” moment where it all clicks.
Life is common sense. The clearer you can see reality and adjust to live in accordance with it, then the faster you will get wherever it is you want to be.
So how does a man live a life worth writing about?
And what does that even mean?
The truth is that it’s not for me to answer. It’s on you. Because your life is your life, and you must make of it whatever it is you desire deep down in your heart. You can’t listen to people on the internet and expect to figure it all out. You can’t copy me or try to be like me. I am Maverick Brenton - my own man - you are not me and you do not think like me. You must listen to yourself and start trusting yourself brother. You must go within and do that painful work.
What kind of story do you want to have? What kind of man do you want to be? What do you want to suffer for and struggle towards? What would make your life worth living? What do you REALLY want to do with the little time you have on earth?
Let me tell you something; we all need far less than we think.
Don’t buy into the narrative of needing to have $100 million dollars in the bank, or a private jet, or anything that anyone tells you that you need to have. Decide for yourself how much you need and what would make your life good. Decide for YOURSELF. I’m happy as long as I never have to think about money. As long as I can write, lift, eat good food and do the things I want. My goal is $1 million per year. I’ll get there. But that’s MY goal. You might want far more or far less. It stops meaning anything at a certain point. Once your needs are met. Then it’s the game that counts, and playing it better than everyone else.
To live a life worth writing about is to do what you want to do.
That’s the simple summary.
It’s to go back to that boy who stared at the night sky, and to become like him again - giving ZERO fucks what anyone thinks about what you do. Then charging into the world with your cock out and doing something worth remembering. One of my earliest articles on this blog was Do What You Can’t. It was inspired by Casey Neistat and a video he made, where he talked about the same shit I’m talking about here; doing what you want to do, instead of what you are expected to do.
Maybe it’s writing novels. Maybe it’s making coffee. Maybe it’s gardening. It doesn’t matter.
Find what tickles your nuts and give it your best. See what you can make of it. I talk a lot about making loads of money and becoming a badass motherfucker. But that’s me. I like Harley Davidson’s, cigars, laying in bed on the weekend with beautiful women, and closing deals. I’m figuring out my tastes. What flavour of life suits me. The man I want to be. What I want my world to look like. Mercedes G class in the driveway. Custom blacked out harley. A simple house with a fireplace and an office with a big desk made of oak. A woman with a good heart who can cook a roast and who makes me feel warm when she smiles.
My life has been worth writing about. I’ve done more at 26 than most have at 50. Which is why I am qualified to write about it. Which is why I do write about it.
But what about you brother?
Can you sit down and smile at the past, thinking about all the epic shit you have done and feel the joy of knowing you’re living the life you want to live? Or are you sleeplessly staring into the dark night, wondering what else is out there for you and what you could have been if you weren’t such a fucking coward?
The purpose of my work is to inspire that boy in you. The rebel. He’s there and he’s well, but he might just need a kick in the ass to come back out again. He might just need a dose of the medicine I deliver here within these pages. You should listen to that kid, because he knows what you want. He’s not afraid to speak his mind, he’s not afraid to express his wants. He’s an individual with a dream. Your dream. The dream that will become a life worth writing about but only if you find the courage to do it.
Until next time
Filed under · International Freedom
