Every few months, I get the alumni magazine from my college. I commonly perceive straight through the class notes to see if there's anything I remember who has gotten mentioned. Most of the entries are a bit, well, dull, saying things like, "Now retired after 30 years teaching in the same school" or "Just retired from 40 years at the bank." Apparently, my fellow college students were big on staying put in one place.
Hunter College
This time, however, an entry caught my eye. It read, "Retired after thirty-five years as a public worker and probation officer. He now spends his time as a big-game hunter and tourist in Africa and is a full-time freelance outdoors writer." I never knew the man so described, but I wanted to. I wanted to know how he kept his adventurous soul alive for such a long time while toiling away in Cook County Illinois.
Leaving a customary situation is a challenge that comes to all of us-sometimes some times throughout our life. I once received e-mail from a woman who had spent her life as a teacher. She had stuck with it long after the delight had gone. Now she was ready, she said, to do something wholly different. However, she wasn't at all distinct what the new path should be. That happens, of course, when we come to be entrenched in a situation or association for so long that we forget that we have options.
I made some suggestions about how she could begin exploring fresh options. I heard from her again after about ten days and she was development great headway. She'd even listed all of her teaching books on eBay-burning her bridges she said. dream my amazement when I opened her most recent e-mail which was obviously written in a moment of great panic. "I only have an additional one week to sign my teaching contract," it read. "Should I sign it?"
I was flabbergasted and promptly replied that I didn't have the write back to her question. I suggested, however, that it might be a temporary lapse on her part and then I said, "So how are you going to tell your grandchildren that you once had an opening to create a truly adventurous life and you chickened out?" The moment I typed that question, I realized at a very deep level, how our acts of self-doubt don't just impact our own lives, but have a profound ripple effect. Take the low road and you'll have a procession behind you. What kind of heritage is that?
We might tell ourselves that staying in a stultifying association isn't literally so bad or having a job that robs us of any creative enthusiasm is fine for now, but every day that we hang on we are losing high-priced time that could be spent construction something bold and beautiful. On the other hand, our acts of courage beget courage in others as well. I'm guessing that my old college classmate will inspire all sorts of citizen to create their own version of a safari.
While letting go can seem terrifying, think of the times you've done so and found yourself in a best place. It's no use tricking yourself into mental that you'll make things best while staying in the bad situation, however. Doesn't work that way. As long as you hang on, you can't move on.
If you're in need of prompting, you might want to post these encouraging words from Ellen Goodman: "There's a trick to the Graceful Exit, I suspect. It begins with the vision to identify when a job, a life stage, a association is over and to let it go. It means leaving what's over without denying its validity or its past point in our lives. It involves a sense of the future, a belief that every exit line is an entry, we are engaging on rather than out...It's hard to learn that we don't leave the best parts of ourselves behind, back in the dugout or the Capital or the office. We own what we learned back there, the perceive and the growth are grafted onto our lives. And when we exit, we can take ourselves along. Quite gracefully."
The ability to manufacture a desired future is directly dependent upon the willingness to break with the past. ~ Robert J. Kriegel
Hanging on Or exciting On?
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