Doubts as Companions

Doubts are a difficult thing to embrace, but I’m going to throw it up against the wall anyway and see what sticks.

Since my decision to jack in my job, leave my place of residence of 6 years and the friends I had made, I have had several periods of almost crippling doubt and anxiety.  Some can last just a few minutes, while others can last for days.  ‘Doubt’ is an inadequate word for the sensations that arise sometimes, I feel.  Depending on the length of time they stay, it can really chip away at what you believe to be a firm foundation for the direction you plan to take your life.  It forces you to critique your own self and your logic, to strip away any and all fantasies surrounding it, and get right down to the nitty-gritty.

Recently, for various reasons, I’ve had cause to doubt several aspects of the direction I have chosen.  Primarily it comes down to questioning the validity of my main proposal: to travel around the world, punctuating it significantly with bouts of philanthropic service.  I have no desire to earn money while doing this, but would like minimise costs associated with bed & board by availing of any host family options, for example.

Next under scrutiny is my ability to actually perform, and this covers a whole host of skills such as the ability to form meaningful connections with the new people I meet, network in relevant areas, do the necessary research, and in-general, get the ground work done that’s required to pull this off.

Then there’s the gorilla in the corner of the room… when all is said and done, I’ve travelled hither and fro, I’m ready to slow it down and settle in one particular place for a while, what do I go back to?  What work/activities will I employ to earn a living sufficient enough to sustain myself, and whomever my dependants are at the time.

The plan

I’ve written before about my complete inability to resonate with work for work‘s sake.  My view is simply this, every single moment of your life spent doing something, performing a task, that isn’t bringing you closer to the fulfilment of a significant goal in your life, is ultimately wasted time.  This doesn’t mean that taking a holiday, or reading a novel, or leisure time is wasted, since it clearly plays its own role in maintaining life’s sometimes precarious balance.  I refer mainly to whiling away the hours, days, and weeks, in a painfully uninspiring position that progresses you no further from where you started, and worst of all, brings you backward.

At the same time, if you find yourself, as I have, realising you’re doing something you actually don’t want to be doing, there’s no harm in that.  Those kinds of experiences teach you what you shouldn’t be doing, and refines your parameters as you search for that which inspires you.  The problem arises when you have such a realisation and you ignore it.

So, on with the show…

I quit my job with a view to “travel the world!”.  How grand?  I didn’t, and frankly still don’t, know a whole lot about where I’ll go, and when, and how.  I have 2 significant events to attend in 2010, one in March in Thailand, the other in April in Bali.  I have a flight for Bangkok booked for early January and that’s literally the sum of all I have planned for my trip.  As I muddle through November and December, I will hopefully be able to refine that a little bit, but right now it’s hard to say how much is possible from here.  My current understanding is that most volunteer work is best sought for when you’re in the region you wish to work.

Once I’ve travelled around and experienced working in many different areas and disciplines, I would like to start my own projects in particular locations that interest me most and capture my imagination.  What that could be is hard to say right now, and I.T./computers is an obvious option, but I think working with/for children is highly likely.  I would also like to make it a self-sustaining enterprise, one that funds itself somehow.  It will obviously need some capital investment up front, but I don’t fundamentally wish to create another charity – something that creates its own revenue which is then fed back into the system is ideally what I’d strive to create.

The flaws

How do you create a business that is wholly socially conscious? I.e. it doesn’t have a separate department so-called “Corporate Responsibility” since it is by-definition a social business, and generates it own revenue and profit, without relying on charitable donations.

I don’t know.

My current belief system (when I’m living consciously) is one that generally favours positive thinking over anything else – if there isn’t a way to achieve a goal I have set out to do, then I will discover that that is the case in due course, and adapt accordingly.

This sounds very straight forward, but I have a feeling the real-life implementation of this is going to be a lot tougher in this case.

The alternative to thinking like this is that “it’s impossible” – it can’t be done and I should basically give up before I try.  This is true of anything in your life that you haven’t yet tried but are afraid to attempt. Anything.

How often do you find yourself making excuses, all seemingly valid – arguably so – that prevent you from actually taking action towards something you want.  Social pressures and habits of a lifetime are hard to break away from, but you have no other choice if you want to find fulfilment in your life.  It doesn’t matter if you fail terribly at achieving your goals and aspirations, but you’ll know that you tried.

I think that most people who read this are in a very wonderfully fortunate position.  How so?  Because if you attempt something that demands of you to quit your current job and try something altogether new and “insecure” and it doesn’t work out as you’d hoped, you may fall on relatively rough times.  But you will probably have a safety net of friends, family, or both that will catch you when you do.  I know I do.  It wouldn’t be ideal, but I’d still be living with a roof over my head and the opportunity to rebuild, and the wealth of life experience garnered from trying would be immeasurable… (at least I’m hoping so!)

A unexpected companion

Doubts are companions we must take on our journey.  They come in the form of critique and questioning both from ourselves and our peers, and may even force us to stop what we’re doing and re-evaluate our decisions and plans. They’re neither good nor bad, and I’d almost say a necessity for hardening our resolve.  Not from stubbornness, but from the realisation that our thinking and resolve has been tested, and we are able to justify ourselves with sound arguments.  Such questioning may prompt alterations to the course, but the ultimate goal is the same – fulfilment!

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