The Adventure - Pt. 1: Why?

My story thus far is pretty typical

From the time I was born, I was groomed to become a productive, tax-paying member of society. Like all good parents, mine wanted me to be "successful": get through high-school with good grades so that I could get into a respected University and get a well-paying job to support my future family.

I wanted to make my parents proud, and of course I wanted to be successful too! I went along with it, hoping to become "successful". I believed that with success, came happiness (little did I know that it was the other way around).

The further I got along this road, graduating university and college and finally landing a job in my field, a nagging feeling began to creep into the pit of my stomach. The kind of feeling you get when you are going somewhere, but then start to sense that you have taken a wrong turn along the way and are getting further and further from your where you wanted to go. A slight discomfort with the trajectory my life was going in. I pushed it to the back of my mind and shrugged it off, too afraid of what I would find if I investigated further.

An Encounter with Death and some follow-up questions

Some time in 2010, a close uncle of mine died. Mortality hit me like a brick, and I found that I was afraid of death. I began to ask some big questions:

• What happens when we die? 
• Do we just cease to exist? We're born, shit happens, then you die. Is life really that brittle and meaningless?
• What we think/believe happens when we die has a huge impact on the way we live our lives whether we realize it or not.
• What is my purpose?
• Do I even have a purpose, or is life just an accident?
• Who am I?
• lol super cliche, but for as long as I have been living with myself, I still had no idea who I was beyond the labels and masks I wore.
• How could I know my purpose if I didn't know myself!?

I went in search of answers in many different ways, some of which are described in my previous blog posts, Know Thyself Part 1 and Know Thyself Part 2. This was the beginning of an inner evolution. Fun exercise - you can scroll back through my Facebook and see my evolution as a person in my posts and in my thinking from 2010 to present. 

In death, I found freedom

In early 2012, in pursuit of those big questions, I had another encounter with Death - soMeThing like a near death experience. Long story short, the experience gave me a new appreciation of life. I remembered how precious life is, and how little time we have here on earth. Too precious to be spent not following my dreams, and too little time to be spent not being happy. 

"Better to have a short life that is filled with what you like doing, than a long life spent in a miserable way." -Alan Watts

The near-death experience rocked my world so completely that when the dust finally settled, I found that I was looking at a different world.

Each breath was a gift and I had the greatest gratitude for just being able to experience - to see, touch, hear, and smell the world around me. To feel emotion, to love and be loved. Problems and worries I was fretting over hours before, now seemed trivial and insignificant. I was no longer afraid of death... everyone dies sooner or later. What I was afraid of now, was not living.

When a decision is made

To be honest, my job wasn't that bad at all. I had a decent salary, full internet access, unlimited free tea and coffee, and wicked benefits. One thing it didn't offer me though, was fulfillment.
That slight discomfort I was experiencing previously pushed its way to the forefront of my mind. As the days and weeks wore on, every morning became a war with myself just to drag my body to work (my mind and spirit often didn't make it lol). Soon, it became unbearable.

After a lot of careful deliberation, I made a decision that aligned with my heart, mind, and spirit : I would quit my job and travel the world... after I saved some money. 

Instantly, it felt as if a huge weight was lifted...  the railroad switch clicked and I was back on track (or at least on a different track). Plans were hashed, discarded, and rehashed. All I knew is that I wanted to travel and make people happy.

Fastforward to today. A lot has happened since I made that decision two years ago and now I'm two months away from taking taking off for the Philippines to get this adventure started. I'm nervous, anxious, and my future is way less certain than before... 

but one change in perspective makes this worth it already: I am now looking forward with excitement to what the future has in store!

Some people may see this as escapism and think I'm running away from real life. I know that this adventure isn't going to solve everything. This is not a final solution, but a way for me to further investigate those big questions. 

The way I see it, I'm not running away from life - I'm running towards it.