I’m sean gray,
nice to finally meet you
Nine years ago, I walked into my house, looked at my wife, Mee, and asked her, “What are we doing?”
“We had no time for each other nor ourselves.”
We’d left the rat race of corporate, big company hospitality firms and had opened a group of small grass-fed burger joints with a couple of partners.
We’d changed what we were doing, but not who we were being.
We had two boys in University, had opened 4 restaurants in the past 3 years and our relationship was held together by memories of the past. We had no time for each other nor ourselves.
The change
Within 3 months we’d sold pretty much all of our belongings, extricated ourselves from the day to day of the business, rented our house and moved to Thailand.
Call it a mid-life crisis or maybe a wakeup call. Either way it saved our marriage and quite possibly our lives.
Living life to it’s fullest, focusing on health and the present moment became our mission.
We spent months at a yoga school in Koh Phangan and I studied massage in Chiang Mai for almost six months. We shopped at the markets and explored. As the money ran low we found The Panya Project, a permaculture school, in Northern Thailand and learned about Permaculture and natural building over the course of the next year.
Back to Reality?
At some point It had to end, or did it?
Our partners were screaming at us to come back and open more restaurants; they wanted to sell, and we were getting tired of living on our limited budget of 2-4k a month.
We made the decision to return temporarily, open a few more restaurants and sell the house. We’d spend 6 months or so we thought and then get back to our adventure.
Six months turned into a year and a half, and we got all of the confirmation we needed as we saw our lives returning to the routine of mediocrity and the old familiar terrain of discontent.
But after that year and a half we’d accomplished our goal and were out. With our home and all of our interests in the business sold we were beholden only to our own choices.
Perhaps that had always been the case, but this felt different.
Bali
Health & Adventure
We spent the next three years in Bali. We built a home, a few airbnbs and, wait for it … a restaurant.
We found yoga and pilates teachers, we developed relationships with the farmers and ranchers that were doing their best to grow regeneratively, we made friends and even brought our kids over for awhile after University to experience life a new.
It opened our eyes to the possibilities that lay out there.
It was during this time that I really started to focus on all things surrounding Health. I travelled to different biohacking centers around Asia; Delving into the effects of the myriad of diets and routines I’d tried over the years. I’d been vegetarian and vegan and keto…you name it and I’d spent years trying it.
I’d had my try at CrossFit and had ten years practicing Ashtanga yoga, but now I finally had the time to go deep into what up till then had been simply “my hobbies.”
Where I’m at now
a little thing called covid..
We’d decided to leave Bali at the end of 2019 and come back and visit the boys and family in the States on our way to our next big adventure; We were thinking Portugal.
The universe had something else in mind…
We got off the plane January 16th, 2020 and then everything hit the fan.
We decided to stay…
We sent for our Biku & Maggie, our dogs, which had been staying with a friend in Bali, and settled on Denver. It had snow and skiing, something we hadn’t seen in quite awhile.
I’ve spent my days exploring diet, fitness, fasting and all of the tech associated. From red lights to cold plunges, fasting to Animal based diets, yoga to strength training – These and much more have filled my days.
I was fortunate that Colorado never REALLY locked down. I was outside skiing, hiking and exploring.
With trips down to the Caribbean and to Mexico, I got my fair share of sun and Vitamin D, and have only gotten stronger and healthier over the past couple of years. I know this isn’t the case for everyone, and I’m particularly grateful for the opportunities afforded me.
I’ve recently moved to Austin, Texas to a little house on the outskirts that has. a smidge of land. We’re planting a garden, probably just to feed the deer, and exploring the farms and ranches in the surrounding area. There’s a few neighbours raising chickens and we can get a huge chunk of our meat from local growers. Our neighbours all seem friendly and go out of their way to introduce themselves. It seems like a pretty special place and we look forward to becoming a part of it.
