What were your hopes/dreams before they were crushed? Did any of them come true?

Check out Foresty Forest and Vancity Vanlife on youtube. They're both Canadian and been at it a long time. Vancity Vanlife is a good kick off point since he started with the most basic build possible and shows the progression of how he built it up over time. Also, not Canadian but Ryan Twomey has a more full-amenity build. Otherwie just search for "van tour" to find a bazillion different builds to get an idea of what's possible.

BTW when searching the term "vanlife" on Youtube there's literally 10 anti-vanlife videos that are always near the top of the search regardless of whether you've watched them already or told YT not to recommend them, it's kinda weird.