This time in Sedona has been remarkable to hike the desert and take in the dry and wild beauty. So unexpectedly refreshing.

Today we visited the Montezuma Castle National Monument doing our normal Freejourners adventuring.

In our travels across the West, I find myself humbled by the ancient people who have lived here for hundreds of years before any Euro-American settlers set foot in the area. They built many natural dwellings. Here in the Montezuma Castle, they were part of a sophisticated and elaborate trade route. So fascinating.

As I took some time to read the history and information, I was simply taking it in with awe. I loved this statement you see above,

The hunter-gatherer lifestyle demanded portable and lightweight belongings; these mobile minimalists lived very lightly on the land.  They survived environmental changes and social pressures through flexibility…”

That’s us! As we have been roaming these last three years, we don’t seek to get bigger. We talk a lot, and we want to get smaller, more mobile and more agile. We are mobile minimalists who live lightly on the land. And we have those portable and lightweight belongings to go up and down mountains with.

I resonated with the way people lived. We are sojourners in this world despite all the embroidery we latch onto – homes, neighborhoods, plumbing, paychecks, grocery chains, etc. I think we get further removed from nature, God’s creation and how things around us really impact us.

Their mindset is so foreign to modern Western societal paradigms:

When the people stayed too long in one place and failed to lead moral and responsible lives, they say, social and environmental catastrophes reminded them of their destiny to move on.

Something happens when you stay too long, I think. You end up dying, not living. You can lose sight of what’s good and right.

Sure, that familiarity can feel like a comfort pillow in the night, but you can end up like that frog boiling slowly in the pot.

Fresh starts can make you see things from completely different perspectives.

I think our kids have that lens. We see things as outsiders, not insiders. And I want that. We have plenty of conformists, go-with-the-flow, normalist, good citizens. But what if you come in like Clint Eastwood to a new town as an outsider and can see things from a different perspective?

What if you can sense when to move on because there’s more noise than life?

I think that’s what the Native Americans who lived on these lands understood, and their ancestors can communicate that oh-so-foreign mindset which our comfort-seeking culture has scaled to.

I’m enjoying the lens and that slight discomfort. That destiny to move on is something that may not ring well for squatters and those who imagine life never changing. But I side with the Hopi tribes who know life is this moving thing.

We can’t contain it. We can move with it when the times demand it.