A bucket list is supposed to be about doing all those things you might normally be afraid to do, right? Well getting on a plane to fly across the country to visit the man I am in love with definitely fell into that fear factor category for me. What if I got there and we had a horrible time? Even scarier, what if I got there and didn’t want to leave? That silly conundrum revealed something to me, perhaps I’m equally afraid of success as I am of failure. Interesting thought, that.
Courage is not something I am normally lack and my career demonstrates that I’m not exactly afraid of success, but when it comes to making myself truly vulnerable to other human beings, well that takes more heart than this Vulcan normally has on hand. My friends would probably laugh at that because they know me as a warm, loving, expressive person, but chances are they forget how long it took to break through my introvert-exoskeleton.
The day I decided to book the tickets for my first cross country trip it was absolutely exhilarating. I was ready to let go of my attachment to any particular outcome and fly by the seat of my pants on a journey of the heart. This journey started over a year before when I took a month off to reflect on my life, career, and start dreaming for the future. I came out of that brief hiatus from work recharged and ready to attack life with vigor and went back to work as a Designer, the unicorn of the software development industry. For the first time since arriving in Portland 4 years earlier I found myself succeeding at work and dating someone steady. The dating was dreamy, including sunny naps in the park during an extended Indian Summer and the design job, well, it was exciting and new. This lasted for all of about 2 months before the rug was pulled out from underneath me and I realized that both my new career and fledging relationship were doomed. Both were sold to me under false pretenses and turned out to be completely different than what I’d signed on for. In the case of relationships there is rarely anything we can do, but with careers that’s a different story.
I took a stand and had my position changed to more accurately reflect the role I was playing at work. A couple months into the new, new role I was beginning to get my head above water, but I still wasn’t happy because I worked so much that there was no energy left over to get a life. On the dawn of the New Year I sat around alone watching the ball drop and vowed that next year would be different, even if it meant taking a huge risk and leaving my job. It was time to start taking some risks in my highly structured, six sigma life where I rarely colored outside the lines. I also was keenly aware that getting a life was going to take a lot of energy and might mean I’d revisit things I once loved, but thought I’d outgrown. I had a feeling that might mean taking a third trip to Burning Man, because I wanted to commune with like minded people and tap my latent creativity. Regardless of how I went about finding my people again, I would need to invest daily in building a community of friends in Portland and beyond if there was any hope of not spending the New Year single and alone for the umpteenth consecutive year.
The risk taking started at work, challenging the status quo and fighting like a mama bear to keep my vision for the future of the product clear and resonant.It was not easy stuff to go through and frankly, I pissed a lot of people off along the way, but through all the growing pains we created something beautiful. A great product and a solid team with great culture. I was plotting my escape the whole while, but from the start of Project Dream Big I’d known that I would follow through on my commitments to work, deliver a beautiful baby for the company that had taught me so many valuable lessons, and move on to designing a beautiful future for myself.
Since I’m a project planner at heart, I gave myself a project a few months before quitting my job and started planning a trip to Black Rock City for my third burn. Despite my exhaustion from work it was energizing to spend my weekends crafting and planning menus. I happened to meet the people who inspired me to articulate this bucket list there, but that’s for another story.
The first day of funemployment finally arrived after a countdown that began at day 123, and I woke up naturally to sunlight feeling more free and happy than I had for years. It wasn’t strictly about not working, since I found myself driven to invent work and create lists upon lists of tasks for myself, it was about being self directed and finally getting to stop and smell all these roses I’ve been planting over the years. I found a veritable Secret Garden in my mind, a wealth of ideas and desires that had been waiting patiently in the garden for just the right time to bloom.
One of these very special roses happened to go by the name of a boy, who will remain anonymous for the purposes of this story. Being in love with him makes me want to be a better person and turns the volume on life up to 11. My quandary was that I had to tell him all of this and the vulcan singleton in me was not exactly accustomed to those conversations. Despite me floundering through it, he wanted me to come see him and it turned out to be one of the most fun, easiest, incredibly romantic weeks of my life. I literally had to force myself to get on the plane to go home and left feeling inspired about what can happen when you really put yourself out there. I returned home with a clear image in my mind of what I’d like for my future and finally managed to finish writing the bucket list I’d been agonizing over for 6 weeks. I highly recommend getting on that plane, even if you turn right back around, because at least if you try and fail, you can still say you tried.
