More to Life

“There has to be something more to life than this?”   That is a line that I say quite frequently.  There has to be something more than the existence of waking up, getting ready to go to work, spending your day working then going home so tired (physically, mentally or both) that the evening is just trying to recover and recoup for the next day.   We talk about this quite frequently.  We are utterly and totally happy with our relationship (and without that I can’t even imagine how I would be feeling).   However, we spend our days working hard to make someone else rich while we take home a simple (yet adequate) paycheck and quite possibly be wondering if there is something more.

Jason and I haven’t figured out the answer to our question that “there has to be something more” yet……but I stumbled upon a book that made a lot of sense I regards to this question.  The book is called The Art of Non Conformity: Set your Own Rules, Live the Life you want and Change the world and is written by ChrisGuillebeau. (Amazon Link)  How could I not read that book with a title like that!    

The first chapters were kept repeating the same dissatisfaction that I have with my life.  The writer even used the same phrase “there has to be something more.”  Now don’t get me wrong.  We both have employment ….we are ok in that regards.  I am helping patients obtain a medication that they need.  So, there is a small sense of satisfaction there.  But there is just dissatisfaction with the fact that I work and with the commute (when I’m in the office) and the actual work day, I am gone from home for at least 11 hours.  By the time I add in sleep, showering and personal hygiene, cooking dinner, laundry and household chores, my day is over.  For five days a week my life is work and pretty much nothing else. Thus, the dissatisfaction.  As I read the first chapters of this book, I knew that I was not alone!

The next couple chapters were the eye-opening chapters for me.  They were eye opening because of a concept that the write was expounding.  It is a very simple concept also.   The writer wrote about two people that he spoke to.  Two people that wanted a life of freedom.  The one person that he spoke to was all gung ho to minimalize his life.  He was all set to sell his car, pare down his belongings, quit his job and take of on a lifetime of adventure and freedom. (Obviously with a financial plan in place.)  The writer of this book talked about how he felt the excitement of this person but how he was sure that it was ‘all talk’ and that if/when he ever saw this person again that the ‘dreamer’ would still be driving his expensive car and living the same humdrum  existence even though the dreamer had expressed how dissatisfied he was and how bad he wanted it!    You see, this apparently happens to the writer of the book all the time after presentations that he makes.  He spoke about a man that he talked to after a presentation….who he saw each year for the next 4 years or so.  That person was always so excited and ready to make the changes.  However, the each consecutive year when he saw the person again nothing would ever have changed.  BUT…that first person that he wrote about, the one that said he was selling his car?  When the writer saw him a year later he had done it!  That guy had done it all and was living the life he wanted.

You see….it’s easy to TALK.  It’s easy to DREAM.  It’s easy to plan.   But you have to REALLY want it in order to actually do it!  How badly do you want it?  Are you willing to DO or are you just content to dream and complain about what you don’t have?

Now, in terms of giving up my job and finding that financial independence it is a difficult step.  Because most of us just can’t up and leave a job to travel or do whatever the dream is.  But it makes one think about of our dreams.  Are you just dreaming “wouldn’t it be nice to be……?”   Or have you taken the steps to turn those dreams into an actual plan??  “I want to do……… and in order to get to that place in my life I am going to do this….this…and that.” 

Isn’t weight loss the same?  I want to lose weight.  How many times have we said that?  I know for myself that I have said that a multitude of times.  I want this bad.  But am I like the guy who wanted to travel and live financially independent that just talks about it but doesn’t DO it?   Or am I like the guy that wanted it and actually went out and sold his car and quit his job?  What kind of person am I when it comes to weight loss?   What kind of person are you?

I can honestly say that at times during my weight loss journey that I have been a doer.  I want and I do.  But lately I have been more like that second person.  I say I want it and oh, I want it bad!  But when it comes down to actually doing the work to attain my goals, I fall apart and revert to simply being a dreamer.  

Yes, sadly for many years of this blog I have been a dreamer.  I talk and talk and talk about my wants and desires but when it boils down to it, I have been making empty dreams and empty promises to myself.  THAT is not going to get me to my dreams!  That will have me spinning my wheels and going nowhere…. which is exactly what I’ve been doing in the last few months!   It is time to enact on my dreams.  It is time to stop making only half-hearted attempts. It is time to get this weight off once and for all!

This book, The Art of Non Conformity was an eye opening.  Yes, it makes me want to take steps to be financially independent from a 9-5 in the office job (and I’m pondering options and thoughts that may make it possible….working up some plan, because we do still need to have an income to survive).  But more importantly,  it made me sit back and look at myself realistically and I’m finally done simply wanting and dreaming about weight loss and to actually take the steps to achieve my desires!