Metamorphosis

In prior times it was called Mid Life Crisis and those who experienced it were viewed as ridiculous stereotypes that had simply gone off the rails. Now it is seen as a crucial stage of development that catapults you into the next stage of your life. It is a re-examination of all the attitudes and activities that fill your waking hours. We question our work, our relationships and our choices in our lives to date. With effort we can stand back from them and see if the choices we have made are congruent with the person we are becoming. Turn off the auto pilot of life and see things as they are. Our life choices often turn out to serve the person we were when we made that choice.

This new mid-life is tempered with a sense of optimism; a sense of infinite possibilities. In my mid life I feel a need to exist without catering to the expansive circle of those who, to varying degrees, rely on me. A freedom to uncover who I am when I am not who I should be. This is actually the beginning and all my life experiences to date have been preparing me for this moment of emergence. I feel a smile in my whole being.

Leap and the Net will Appear!

I need to leap. I can spend another year in the safety of my paycheck or I can leap and trust that I will go forward. Any other time in my life when I have leaped, it has worked out. Not always in the direction I intended but it has definitely worked out. I feel the need to have a cushion to land on but building that cushion feels slow and I am ready to fly.

The end of the year is significant. It makes me confront the reality that I have been blogging on the subject for a year now. Safety or Freedom.

Interesting that there is nothing safe about Freedom. It is a choice of living always with a potentially unpredictable outcome. It is a choice of living with inconsistent income. Scary thought. My family relies on me for the good life!

Interesting how the very thing that I cling to is also the thing I would like to run away from. The predictability of life is both a goal and a fear! I crave new experiences yet I seek the safety of my day to day life. Is there a way to combine the excitement and safety. Maybe. And maybe after I take the step that puts me out there but maintains the path back, I will not ever want to return.

I am looking over the edge but I cannot see what is below. I commit to making my leap in 2010.

Marathon Woman

There is a LottoMax commercial on television that shows a woman running through several different landmarks in the world including St. Marks Square, an African landscape, a beach and on the Great Wall of China. As a lifelong runner (in some shape or form) I was immensely attracted to that commercial, not for the lottery money, but rather for the idea of running through the very destinations that play in the background of my mind. Running and travel. A few of my favorite things. When a commercial appeals to you , you know that you are the demographic targetted by that product marketer. Reciprocally when you find a commercial that irritates, you know that you are not their target market. I am exactly the Lotto Max target market. I think they are targetting a new potentially lucrative market with this commercial. I am not a typical lottery target market. Yet I completely identify with that commercial. It is not the running part of it that will appeal to the masses but rather the opportunity to experience new places and things.

A marathon when I was 30 in Toronto. A marathon when I was 40 at Disney Orlando. I had planned to run the Great Wall when I turned 50 but life got in the way. Need to keep that on the list. Hmmm....May 15th, 2010. Might be just the injection I need to break out of my complacency. Life is waiting patiently for me.

Will I Love It? A Revelation of Insecurities

I monitor numerous travel blogs and I love the writers' apparent lack of direction and ability to experience the moment. I love the exotic places and their seemingly effortless ability to 'get local' in whatever environment they happen to be in. I love to take photographs and I envy their freedom to create a picture that captures their moment.

I wonder if when given my wildest dream, is there a possibility that it could become my wildest nightmare. I have gotten posh and soft since my younger years of travelling on trains and living in dorms. Can I live communally aboard a sailboat in order to experience the journey? Can I live local? How do we define that word local? Are there multiple definitions and levels of living local? Do I know how to do nothing and just be in the moment anymore? What will take the place of the incessant list that scrolls in my mind? Will I mourn the life that I left behind? Maybe. I can always come back and do what I do now. Can't I? Will I? I cannot imagine going backwards but it reassures me as I look into an unplanned future.

There I think I inadvertently hit on it. Unplanned. My whole life is planned and predictable. Safe. A recurring theme in my blog is my fear of the unknown. Of change.

"You must do the thing you think you cannot do." (Eleanor Roosevelt) Hmmmm.

Can I rediscover my authenticity under the layers of acquired adaptive behaviors? Maybe travelling can accelerate this process.

Will the money last? There is a lot of it but truly I am unaware of what it would take to be a nomad full time. I am not a backpacker/camper/sleep with a pile of students kind of person but I have discovered ways of travelling that are none of these yet within budget.

I am 10-15 years from retirement so really this is a decision to retire if I go now. But there are ways to create a meaningful, lucrative retirement should I decide to come back.

There. I have laid all my insecurities in writing. Very therapeutic. Illuminating.

Location Independence

What a concept! Working to provide your income stream from wherever you happen to be. It seems that lots of people do it both through freelancing or working for a company that does not require you to be in an office but just to generate work flow. What about remote entrepreneurship? Interesting idea if you can put the business on auto pilot and be free to move and experience while you check in from afar. Is it possible? From reading too many online blogs it would seem you can eke out a moderate to a quite lavish lifestyle while maintaining your freedom to be where you choose.

As I come to the close of my busiest work season, I realize that what I give right now to my company taxes my sanity and my good spirit. I work long hours right now with an expected refund in January and February. But you cannot refund your health and the times missed with family. So how can I make the leap. I remain dependent on the income my job provides and wonder at the same time if I live up to my income.

Am I able to leave work and make a lifestyle that nurtures me? My investment divisor is 31.5 meaning that at this age I have 31.5 years left to live. 31.5 years...what do i want to fill those years with.

Gary Vaynerchuk speaks vehemently on liking what you do for a living. He says that if you dislike your job 1% you need to find something else to do. How about if you dislike your job about 50% and the other 50% that you enjoy is the downtime when you spend the least amount of time on the job!

Location Independence sounds amazing. Gotta go there.

Early Victory

Ten out of fifteen stores who were presented the product said yes so far. Three days in we have our first reorder from an amazing store and an amazingly supportive woman. She sold eight of her ten items. Now I just need to figure out how to make the product profitably. That is my next big step. Early numbers say it is possible to make money on this.

Breakthrough again!

Interesting that I began selling the new product this week and I am definitely excited to see how it is received by the stores and then if the consumer is willing to exchange cash for my product. Because I work full time right now I hired a sales person to execute on this for me. Stay tuned on results. This is the moment of truth after all the weeks of preparation.

My next dilemma was that I was not sure that I could make money selling the product. And if not, then it is not a relevant step on my path to autonomy and freedom. The cost of product was too high and the retail price point was fixed as it was an variation on an existing product. And then I did that "10 solutions brainstorm" on the problem. It included things like raising the price, shipping out of a printer in California who was slow to quote and reply. (red flag) It included going to a trade show to scout alternatives for printing and then the breakthrough solution came.

I have always been wary of shipping out China but I went online to globalsources.com and alibaba.com and registered and requested quotes on my product. The early ones are coming in at .32 per unit versus the $8.00 I am currently paying! Need to investigate a little more. I have a friend who brings product from China and I will request that her contact checks out my possibilities. All of a sudden the project is feasible again!

Business possiblilities and adventure. It satisfies two of my goals. Interesting how when each step of the process is difficult I pull back and think "it is not going to work." And now I know to keep looking for solutions. I recommend that you brainstorm solutions with a friend. Two brains multiply your results exponentially. I am not there but I am on a new path that feels like it may resolve the issues. I wish I could stay in North America but if I do I will not be able to continue.

Here is what I learned in this lesson. The little voice in the back of my mind works against me to discourage me and keep me staus quo. Safe and settled. How easily we choose safety over adventure and potential happiness. This new road feels daunting in the face of a series of new challenges that I have yet to define. One foot in front of the other. If you view the whole task it looks like a mountain. If you look at the next step it is easy. My mountain is production in Asia...HUGE. My next step is to contact my friend who is already producing in China about the project....EASY.