A WOMAN has revealed how she ditched her successful life, along with a sporty red convertible and moved into a Ford fan.
Christine Meachum has detailed all about her life in her YouTube channel and how she went about making some drastic changes.
She says in her online biography: “After working for many years in sales and business ownership, I felt major burnout.
“I sold my houses, extra cars, and most of my belongings.
“Now I'm happier than ever having very few material things.
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“I travel living out of my vehicle with my old and blind best friend, Chase the Dog.
“We roam the USA looking for adventure, food, and fun! I'm never sure what the future holds.”
She opened up about her life living out of a van and how she ended up in a van life in a recent online clip.
Christine said: “I started out adulthood very career focused. I tried college but it didn't feel right so that lasted less than two semesters.
“I was drawn to sales because it seemed exciting and had a high income potential.”
She started selling security systems and moved up the industry for more than a decade.
But while she enjoyed the work, she also struggled with the constant rejection and pressure to hit quotas.
She also didn’t “feel right” simply sitting at a desk in an office all week.
Despite being stressed she managed to perform well and from the outside appeared to be succeeding.
She also dated a guy from when she was 20 and they were together for 16 years.
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They had a four-bedroom house set in four acres of land and a rental property.
She also had two cars, one was a “sporty red convertible” and could afford to buy the things she wanted thanks to a high income.
LIVING 'PAYCHECK TO PAYCHECK'
But while the money was coming in, it was also flying out and she was living “paycheck to paycheck”.
Over time she realised “that’s not where my happiness lay”.
Christine said: “I had felt the pull towards minimalism since watching the movie Into the Wild in 2009 but I suppressed it to pursue material success because I thought that was the only way to be secure and happy.”
I was being drawn towards downsizing and shedding the things that didn't feel like me anymore
Christine Meachum
But she said things started to shift when she turned 30 though and she felt the desire “to create a life that had peace and felt right to me.
“I was being drawn towards downsizing and shedding the things that didn't feel like me anymore.”
She sold her convertible and started making plans to spend less and travel more.
Christine also quit her sales job and became self-employed in 2016.
Since then she’s had a few businesses, the largest was a cornershop she opened with her partner.
As a business owner she admitted she’d “experienced great success and massive failure” but also gained a lot about herself.
Christine said: “I found that I do best on my own with a small operation after my partner and I amicably split ways in 2021.
I choose to live in my car because being free of all those material things has allowed me to live a life of freedom and joy
Christine
“I moved into my van in my parents backyard, that way I could get used to living in a vehicle while still in a safe environment.”
She then set out on the open road in the autumn 2021 and also launched her YouTube channel.
Initially, Christine had intend to go travelling full time but after a few months, she started missing her family in Michigan and so came home for a while and is still trying to find the balance between being with her family and travelling.
She said: “The older I get the more I fully understand that it's the people you love in your life that make it worth living.
“Everything else is secondary, it took a year and a half to do but I finally sold my houses my extra cars and all of my unnecessary possessions.”
Christine added: “I choose to live in my car because being free of all those material things has allowed me to live a life of freedom and joy.
“I have very minimal bills I can go where I want when I want, I have the freedom to work on what inspires me at a pace that feels right to me.”
She also said she wanted to see more of the world and travelling in a car was the easiest and cheapest way to do that.
Christine said: “So much of the first two decades of my adult life has been figuring out what doesn't work but I feel like I've gained a tonne of wisdom from the many mistakes I've made over the years.
“Because of that process I I've learned who I really am and how to create a life that feels right to me.”
In previous footage she detailed her experiences of her first week living in her SUV.
Showing how she cooked breakfast over a camp fire.
Christine does recommend doing a test night at home for anyone thinking of embarking on a similar life as she found that she did need to rearrange things in her van and discovered she had forgotten things she had needed.
She was also worried she had over-packed the van and it may be too cramped as it was full of all her stuff.
Elsewhere, a couple say they were fed up of rip-off rentals, they went to live in a van.
Another couple say they moved into their van so they could live cheaply off grid.
Meanwhile, a woman lives in a van on her own in the woods and she says she loves it.
