Go Ahead…Call It A Mid Life Crisis!!

Is it time to call a spade a spade? I can do that – I can call this a mid life crisis…but then I’m just not sure what to do with it!

The term ‘crisis’ seems a bit too serious really.  I mean, I’m not unhappy, or depressed, or in need of psychotherapy for crying out loud! And I’m not leaving my partner for a young cabana boy, buying a convertible, and dressing in tight leopard print skirts (although who am I to judge if that’s how you question your reality?).

I am just questioning the droning out of daily life that, I know, we all experience. I guess I have the privilege of having a midlife crisis – many people must feel the same way but do not have the opportunity to ‘step out’ and take a break. That has, in fact, been one of the pieces that I’ve been struggling with…who am I to do this? What makes me different from anyone else? There are millions (billions?) of people out there who are also questioning their reality and they don’t have the options that I do. Maybe it’s my English roots, but I feel like I’m being a bit ‘posh’. Let’s just say that I know how lucky I am.

And I’m not the only one.

• As I shared my plans with my coworkers, my friend Lisa also shared that she and her family were selling their home and moving to Italy for a year – thank you, thank you to our boss (who reads this blog) for being able to support us both during this time! She will be blogging soon – right Lisa B?
• J’s long time friend Michelle called not long after we ‘came out’ asking if we were all somehow linked, as both she and her husband had quit their jobs, rented their house and were moving to Maui with their children for 6 months of learning Spanish, surfing and soul searching. She is blogging about it at michelleonmaui.
• Lisa’s brother-in-law Dirk announced last week that he has been fired from his job. He was fired not because he wasn’t doing a good job, because he is certainly capable of doing a good job, but because he didn’t want to do it anymore and it showed. His blog, My Minds Ink, includes, among other musings, his new ‘Project’ whereby he will examine what it is he wants to do and how to go about doing it.
• Our neighbor told us yesterday that he had just up and quit his job after a day that pushed him over the edge.
• Just today a mountain biking friend also explained that he had quit his job to attend a tourism program at our local university. Enough of the high tech world that he had been part of, and back to his roots in tourism and outdoor adventure.
• Check out our blogroll for other examples of people, just like us, who have left their regular life behind to travel the world.

Granted, this is a small sampling of people and, one could argue that I am drawn to people who think like me and, therefore would naturally know people who are apt to question the same way I do. Or is it like when you buy a new car and then notice how many of that new cars just like yours are out there? Fair enough.

I’ll share a story. Years ago, my best friend took me to her family’s remote holiday spot. A bucolic location in Desolation Sound called Refuge Cove. There I had many a wonderful time, and met many wonderful people. I soon realized that a couple of these people were some of the most educated people I had ever met. A PhD in English and education ran the coffee shop and bakery with his wife. A PhD in crystal physics ran the local hamburger stand. At the time I thought “what are these people doing here? Why aren’t they off educating people or dazzling the world with their knowledge?”. I still think they are some of the smartest people I have ever met…but now it’s for different reasons.