A year off work – One month in…

The first month of our year off work has been completed and Jackie asked me to reflect, so where to start.  Post the Christmas and New Year catch up with friends and family, we relocated from Devon, moving North to the Lake District.

Walking had been going well whilst in Devon and there was no slow up with almost 300km completed during the month. I have found walking over the years to be the best way for me to lose all those busy thoughts and disappear into the landscape, with some heart pounding ascents and the warm glow you develop after a good all day hike.  It was a sort of mental therapy.

I start with a quote that I think sums it up for me

“The Secret of Change is to focus all of your energy, not on fighting the Old, but on building the New.” Socrates

Easy to say but hard to deliver; let me explain.  I have been pretty transparent about what we were planning for this year; a new decade, a new direction. I was asked the following question “…but what if you really enjoy the freedom, could you ever go back to the office?”  To be honest I don’t know the answer, but if that becomes true then we will figure it out and devote all our energy on building the new, and not clinging to the old “life raft”.

Initially it has felt like a holiday (just a short break from the old) with frequent trips to the local for a pint or two and just having fun, but we’ve quickly discovered that we need a little more structure to achieve things as we’ve just been putting them off till tomorrow.  So the alarm clock has begun to be set, and plans drawn up.  One of them was to start the experience of house and pet sitting, using a web site where people post their houses and it connects them to sitters who take care of everything in exchange for some free digs.  We have the idea to do this across the globe as we move around Europe and further afield.  So we registered, created a profile and on our return from the Lakes to Devon, experienced our first sit in Worcester, which was a very successful experience.   No sitting around and staring at the wall, but action.  We have also been planning out each month, arranging lodgings, have booked one-way flights to Canada and are currently researching how to get to the polar bears on a restricted budget.

But there is a reality…Money. Not many people can honestly say that they work solely for the love of it and when the money stops coming in how do you not worry about it?  For the first time I am taking notice of the price of fuel, making cost based choices in the supermarket and weighing up the difference between going to the pub versus a bottle of wine at home.  We have a budget to live and travel on for the year but it is hard to grasp the new reality.  One person said to me recently “I’m not going to stop working (even though I no longer take any pleasure from it) because I would worry so much about not having enough money in life, it would take all the enjoyment out of the freedom”

On the flip side we now have head space, and I gave myself 6 weeks to clear mine, take a step back and contemplate; not forcing it, just seeing what happens. Nothing happened at first as it was hard to grasp not working. So I stopped shaving and grew a beard as a manifestation of the change from the old (shave every morning for work) to the new.  It has truly worked for me as now a different person looks back in the mirror and the routine has been broken.  Funny side note, have you ever sat in a 3 day meeting and each day everyone sits in exactly the same chair as before.  Have you ever changed seats on day 3 and watched the chaos as everyone comes in and the status quo has changed?  Do it.

My wife has noticed a lighter me; more smiles, more laughter, more engaged with people in restaurants, pubs and on the street. Looking inside I know there is more to come, I can kind of feel it; a strange sense of excitement in the stomach, restlessness in the legs, a growing sense of motivation to achieve something for the sheer joy of doing it! Funny thing, we have made more friends in the last 3 weeks than we have in the last 24 months.

Lastly, what does having additional time bring? I had predetermined thoughts about how having more time in the day would manifest itself; time to learn Italian, read books, blog etc…but in fact that has not been the case.  We have walked more, taken more photos, and started to explore those little routes from the door that have always been ignored due to time constraints.  These little routes are less travelled by people, providing deer sightings, intense bird song, birds of prey hunting and some truly spectacular views; who would have thought simple walks from the door could provide so much!

So as we begin the second month, we are ramping up the social media, and now have Instagram, Twitter and this web site set up.  If you would like to see more please remember to follow, … if you have the time that is.