As I stared through the 5 inch faux-glass window of the Qantas jet, I realized I was finally home. I could see the Golden Gate Bridge. The Transamerica Pyramid. The old Candlestick Park. But more importantly, I could see my future.
My time abroad was adventurous, tiring, educational, timely, enjoyable. But I quickly realized while in Sydney, Australia that what I truly wanted was right under my nose the whole time. Had it not been for taking this excursion, I would not have found my true identity and my true desire in life.
I started my voyage by quitting a secure 9-5 cube job that paid well in Tempe, Arizona. Everyone thought I was crazy including my coworkers, friends, and much of my family. Most of these people have this sense that security is far more important than happiness. I preach the complete opposite. If being a bum biking across the US of A is what would make you the happiest person in the world, then why not try and achieve such. To me, the only thing worse than thriving for complete security in life is not being happy in the way you live your life. Now there is nothing wrong with security. But making your entire life goal a focus of security only makes you miss out on everything around you that has risk. And risk can bring about some of the greatest feelings in one’s life.
The risk I took was to become broke. As Tim Ferriss, author of Four Hour Work Week, has said time and time again, on a scale of 1-10 (10 being the best and 1 being the worst) what is the worst case scenario for my life. If I go broke, at worse, my life is a 3 and I start all over again. But if I take the risk and find happiness in something, my life is a 10 and I keep doing that. You can always make a comeback. But if you don’t take the risk, then you will never know if you could have fulfilled true happiness.
In my situation, I am still happy with my life. I don’t have a job or a car or lots of money. But what I do have is life experience. I tried to live a life in a foreign land and see if that is what would make me truly happy. And now that I have tried such and realized that is not what I want, I can move on knowing I tried. If I was still sitting in my cubicle in Tempe, I would still be going back to work daily wishing I had tried to move to Sydney. On a scale of 1-10, I am probably a 6 right now. When I was working in my cube, I was probably a 5 or 6. So what is the worse that happened. I am just back at square one attempting to find a life that I am happy with. My risk did not make me less happy nor did it make me happier. What it did do is answer that question in the back of my head that said, “Why not? Why not try to move to Australia?” Now I know and I can move forward towards a life of happiness in something else.
I will be moving to the Southern California area as what I discovered while in Sydney was that racing, training and enjoying the beautiful weather is all I really need in life. Sure I need a roof over my head and food on the table. But I can limit the unnecessary things that consumed my life and money in Arizona, such as alcohol, fast food, unnecessary Target spending, and spend my time and money more wisely to continue following a path that will lead to that 10 on the happiness scale.
As the plane touched down at San Francisco International on July 10th, I knew one excursion had ended but my happiness excursion is still on course.
Sometimes excursions end up coming back full circle to find what you want. However, without those excursions in life, one truly may never realize that the life they want is back at the place it all started.
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