Should I Quit My (Great) Job To Travel Round The World?

It’s easy to choose a good option from a not-so-good option, it becomes difficult choosing between one great option from another great option.

This day will come for many of us. When you have to decide which course of life to take. Should I continue down X or should I go after Y?

These options take different forms as we get older and priorities change.
I’ve had to decide should I stay in my bedroom or rent it out? Should I continue watching TV or should I go read a book? Should I stay longer in Negril or move along to Montego Bay? and a bunch of other mundane choices.

For most of us, it’s easier to make a choice when you’re deciding on the more simple decisions in life “should I wake up now or hit snooze”. The higher the weight of impact on your life, the more difficult it is to “simply decide”.

A question like: should I marry a partner that will always have a great public appearance or should I go after the partner that will always make a house our home? is a question most men will continually ask themselves. And, if you’re like the rest of us, you don’t simply decide to “marry beauty or to marry caring”, you tend to go back and forth between options until one of the options pick you or you train yourself to pick the “wise” option everytime.

There are no concrete guidelines on what a good life choice or a bad life choice should look like because some experiences are worth the life spent. People with “bad” choices might not benefit from the experience but they do serve as a life lesson for others.

It’s important to remember:
Though there might not be a clear line on what course to choose for your life, you do have to live in the discomfort or glory of your choices.

Here I am, pondering which direction to take. It is true I dont have to decide today but if I am to make a move in six months, I have to know as soon as possible (today). Do you remember this post about my thought process eight months ago?

I love to travel. The question becomes do I love to travel because my adventure has an end date in the form of a return ticket and stacks of workload? or do I love to travel because I get to redefine who I am, free of worry and routine and the awesomeness of a new experience? It’s important to know.

Think about it, do we really enjoy fireworks because they’re just great or because they’re very fleeting, here now, gone now. Do you really like babies that much because they’re the best thing ever or do babies look “so cute” because you know, very soon they’ll never be at that stage and size ever again?

As humans, we place more value on things when we know they won’t last long. Other times we tend to realize how much we valued a thing after it’s no more. Rarely do we know how much we value something at the time we’re experiencing life.

As much as I love to travel, I also love my job. And, it’s easy to know why.
I enjoy what I do for a living not because I might not have the job tomorrow, though true but I rarely think of that. I like my job because it’s so easy to like the job. The environment is designed and carefully cared for, to make sure you enjoy being there. We have a person who’s task is to get everyone together and give you cake every thursday of the month. Very simple things.

I like the actual work. It’s been important for me to show how dedicated I am in accomplishing tasks, and I get just that. With a boss that rarely gets in the way. Rather than choosing a choice for you, my boss will make the decision yours. You get to live with your decision and explain yourself should it be the wrong one.

I feel involved in what I do, to the point of knowing I probably cannot take more than a few days off or the machine won’t move like it should. I’m engaged in the process. This is easily the best job I’ve had and I longed for a job like this for a very long time. Pissing it away is not just an easy decision to make.

You see my dilemma? pulled in two directions. Now do you remember this post?

I remember when I first started the job, I told my friends I would rate the job 100 percent out of a 100 percent. The job was all that to me.

There’s a good sense of self when you’ve learned your new role and function like the position was designed to fit your style of work. As months go by, the job is still at a strong 95 percent. I am starting to fit the position and new city.

Let’s get more critical: “I have a good job” almost sounds like saying “I have a golden handcuff” or “a beautiful prison cell”.

Then again, why do I really want to travel the world? Am I running from the responsibilities of daily living? Am I just selfish and over optimistic to think my daughter will be just alright if she sees me everyday for three months and then go three months only hearing my voice on the phone? Am I always prone to move far away whenever my parents move closer to where I live? Do I not believe I can find love that I’d be interested in where I live?

If a job is like a prison cell, is travel like a run away child? Let’s move on.

If I stayed:
Cubicle bound job — no option of remote working. Little stress.
I get to buy the very fast luxurious car I’ve wanted for a while.
I’ll live in a dream home.
I’ll grow a personal business on the side and manage it.
I’ll travel for nine days at a time, every three months. Plus work holidays, I’ll go on atleast six trips every year.
I’m being groomed for more responsibilities and more opportunities, with a promotion lurking around in two years.
I’ll have at least two weekend days to engage in my interests, I can write, hike, take boxing class, swimming class, acting class, table tennis tournaments.
I’ll have job history to qualify for most loans to expand my side business.
This is the “American Dream”.
If I keep my job, I can do almost everything on my travel list but for a short time — rather than sit in Italy for a month, I can be there for nine days.

Travel:
I want to live a month or three in Italy.
I want to fly to France and walk the Camino into Spain.
I want to find and shadow a mentor writer and take writing lessons.
I want to learn how to swim, I want to rediscover my interest in acting.
I want to reach Australia, volunteer for a month or three with Hillsong or find a job and work there for a year.
I want to learn history of early Asia
I want to go to Germany and improve my table tennis skills
I want to go to a monastry
I want to go to Egypt
I want to fall in love in the UK
I want to volunteer, help people as I go — which really is what I’m alive to do.
Just free, not bound to schedules. Challenged to start my own business.
I can stay, I can go, all up to me.
I know not of a time when I “didn’t need a job” this could be one.
At what point, do you do your own thing? Forget traveling the world at retirement, I’d rather live now than just exist acquiring more and more stuff.

I understand this decision might have been fairly simple for some who made the leap. It doesn’t take too much thought to know you want to bail from a terrible work situation. For others it’s more of a nail biting situation where neither is very terrible but neither is also very easy to walk away from.

At the end of life, there will be consequences. Opportunity costs. Things you let go of and things you kept. Habits you broke and a toddler version of yourself you kept through the years. Wherever your path takes you, make the decision yours.

Time will tell which path I stick to but I know I’ll travel - be it with a cubicle job or without. I don’t know what decisions you face right now, but know, you will make the right decision.

Some people get every step of life decided for them and some people go the opposite of whatever path, others chose for them. Don’t be some people.

Think hard and wise, consider paths you want to take, choose one and never look back.

We are to live a life with no regrets, now you’re at the fork in the road. Both paths lead to a wonderful life experience but remember you do have to live in the discomfort or glory of your choices. Don’t settle for being alive, live!

With Love,

Famous Steve.