Our society tends to be based around a specific life model: we go to school to learn how to be successful adults and become educated for a career; we then meet a partner and settle into a home with children and said career; we work at this career five days a week, see our families for a few hours when we get home, and continue this rendition until retirement. Once we have achieved this way of living, we are thought to have the good life.

Yet no one seems to be feeling very good. Rather, people count down the minutes until the end of the work or school day so they can escape the place where they are forced to spend a third of their lives. They idolize Friday as the saviour that ends the monotony of the workweek and dread Monday as the figure of doom that forces them to start the mundane routine all over again. They are oozing stress, drained of joy, and full of regret that they don’t have more time to spend with their friends and family. They work all year just to be able to continue this life, with maybe a few weeks of vacation to “escape the real world”, the good life. And they continue to do it because “that’s just the way life is, the way things go, the way they’re supposed to be”. We go through life not doing the things we want to because “there’s not enough time”. The average Canadian lives more than 80 years. That’s 29,200 days. 700,800 hours. 42,048,000 minutes. Not enough time?! That’s crazy!! With all that time, why does our general life model declare we spend the largest portion of it on things that we do not want to do at the cost of the things that we enjoy? And why do we all go along with it, even feeling uncomfortable when our experiences stray from that norm, confused when other people don’t live their lives the same way?

More and more lately, I am coming to realize that life doesn’t have to be that way! I do not, in fact, have to spend every Monday to Friday doing the same job that no longer makes me happy, just so that I can afford to stay in this place and do this thing. I do not have to choose one career and continue on that path until I am finally lucky enough to retire. I do not need to have a set plan for the rest of my life. I do not have to choose one city and rest my feet there for my entire life, catching a few brief glimpses of the rest of the world on those rare occasions I get a holiday. To further that thought, I do not have to spend all of my best years on this planet living only for the weekends and the couple of weeks a year I get to escape on vacation. I can make my whole life an adventure!!

And so I will…

I have started preparation for selling my house and given notice that my business is closing. The first travel plans are coming together, along with ideas of what we will do in between worldly adventures for income and accommodations. Certain things are falling together in a way so perfect you could call it fate. Am I scared? Yes – terrified in fact. However, the excitement outweighs the fear so much there’s no way it’s going to stop me. I’m going to live my life for ME, MY way, and I have never felt more confident!