I’ve just arrived in Panama; day 3 of our next four month adventure on a Caribbean island. After our year in Spain, Amy and I learned that we’re happiest – most free and focused on things we deem important – when we’re free of “stuff”, and absorbed in a new culture. It’s not for everyone, I appreciate, but we work deliberately to make it a reality for us.
One of the fringe benefits of relocating on a regular basis is that the new environment provides a natural opportunity to reset. To get deliberate about how we craft our days, and where we focus our energies. This is not unlike, I’m appreciating, the habitual setting of “New Year’s Resolutions” that so many of us North Americans subscribe to. The major difference is that it’s triggered by something other than the calendar clicking over to a new year.
There’s something powerful about a clean slate. A natural planning phase and undeniable optimism at how the future may unfold. I realize too that, while a new location may be a natural trigger, it’s not the only trigger we can use to climb out of the weeds and refocus on what really matters to us. What we’re working towards. What our elusive dent in the universe looks like. Calendar dates work as a resetting point – back to school, holiday weekends and, of course, the transition into a new fiscal or calendar year. But so do other major events – moves, children, new jobs, new projects, etc. Should your life happen to be devoid of these types of milestones however, I think the healthy objective, for all of us, is to be deliberate in creating those “start points”. Choose an arbitrary Tuesday, if need be.
When Seth and I discussed the nature of projects, one of the underlying themes that we danced around without addressing directly, was the energy that comes from starting something. So why wait for it to happen to you? Why not get deliberate on creating more starting points in your life? That, I believe, is one of the fastest and cheapest ways to get yourself out of a rut.
