Guanajuato, Mexico, photo courtesy of Letty Cal.
The image above was captured the night I committed to the journey of this book. At the time I was living in a beautiful condo in the Queen Anne neighborhood of Seattle, the cost of which was being subsidized by my insurance company. While the condo was spacious and afforded dramatic views of the Space Needle, downtown Seattle, and Mount Rainier, it was virtually empty and soulless. This was due to the fact that the few earthly possessions I had left were boxed up in a storage unit north of the city. I was living in the condo because my house had burned down a few months prior, but that's another story for another time...
My love of travel was born as a soccer player in New Jersey’s competitive soccer scene. My passion for the sport and the gift of athleticism took me all over the United States, Canada, Europe, and Jamaica, eventually earning me a full athletic scholarship to a top-20 Division I program at Loyola University in Baltimore, Maryland. It was there I received a Bachelor of Arts in Creative Writing and Philosophy.
In 2006, I began my life as an adult traveler. After a relationship and a job ended in the same week, I left everything behind to volunteer for two months at an orphanage in Tanzania (featured on 60 Minutes). The following two summers I traveled with a friend throughout Holland, France, and Spain to create Jack Will Travel, a loosely defined adventure/creative writing and video project about two knuckleheads from New Jersey trying to make a travel show. I also dabbled in improv, commercial acting classes, and was the front man in a Seattle band.
In the professional arena, I've spent more than fifteen years writing, marketing, and developing campaigns for some of the world’s largest brands, including Microsoft, Nordstrom, T-Mobile, Carbonite, Intel, Booking.com, American Express, Seattle Children’s Hospital, and Holland America Line.
Unexpectedly, in November, 2016, I quit my 9-5 to help edit a book for an educator, lecturer, and NY Times bestselling author who explores the latest findings from the fields of neuroscience, quantum physics, and the science behind spontaneous remissions. In October, 2017 it debuted at #15 on Amazon and was translated into 28 language within the first nine months of publication. Upon completion of this assignment, I bought a one-way ticket to Mexico and lived in San Miguel de Allende for 2.5 months to complete my own book. Currently I'm helping another NY Times bestselling author edit a book. And here we are...
I'm always looking for new and interesting creative projects that either entertain or awaken people, so feel free to reach out.
~ Tim Shields