Outgrowing a Picture Perfect Life
Chapter 1: Leaving It All Behind at 31
When I left my picture perfect life 4.5 years ago, it wasn’t some poetic liberation. It was more like a leg that needed to be amputated in the jungle. Okay—maybe not as gruesome but it definitely felt messy, unavoidable, and scary. Any preconception was birthed from an unrelenting, haunting feeling of being in the wrong place. Lingering for comfort’s sake meant that at some unknown time some gate somewhere would come down and lock me in to that life… forever. I felt the urgency in my bones and in my cells—my body was screaming at me and it had already been trying to get my attention with my health.
From the outside, I had truly gone insane. People that I thought were friends told me as much. Colleagues were pissed that I was done selling my soul for prestige and a 401k (Cognitive dissonance, much?). The last weeks at work were hard. Everyone was passive-aggressive and… I’ll say it: probably a little jealous of my audacity.
Everyone does things for their own reasons. Mine were hard to articulate which definitely didn’t help. Every rational part of my mind was constantly questioning what I was doing. The other part—what I now know to be intuition—was shouting at me to get out while I still had the balls to do so.
The fucked up part? I wasn’t leaving anything physically harmful or threatening. Aside from being way past burnt out from over-extending at work, a severe lack of boundaries, and taking ownership over everyone’s emotions rather than feeling my own, everything was pretty secure. On paper, it had looked like I struck gold for that life.
But my soul knew I’d never grow there.
That’s the irony about comfort and security. Coming from deep familial dysfunction, I craved security and comfort so that’s exactly what I had built for myself. But those things rarely equal personal growth.
Holding on to what felt familiar and safe while being driven by some unseen force to leave it behind is, well… the image that comes to mind to explain the feeling is of a teddy bear under tension, getting ripped apart at the shoulder seams. My God, it was awful. Anyone who subjects themselves to leaving a life for the potential of nothing but knowing it’s not the right fit has my deepest empathy. I get it. It’s fucked up and liberating and messy. There’s a reason some people fantasize about it but never do it.
I’m glad I did it. But I didn’t know what I was in for…
Until the next chapter, friends. Create bravely and bet on yourself.
