We’re Taking Life Forward: Here’s What’s Up

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luke-in-water-florida

I just wrote a whole blog post about contentment and how I’m super into it, but how I’m now ready for a life of action. And then I deleted it.

Because it was a lie.

I want to be a person who has, at some point, been content with normal life. But I’m just not.

I like to say I’m a simple person – and that is true. I just adore consistency. I drink black coffee purchased form the grocery store coffee aisle. I wear makeup maybe twice a week. I chose a hair style that requires no more than 20 seconds of teasing once a day, tops.

But I am not content. I am a person of action. I want to take risks, I want to move forward.

Life as an Army family has made that easy for us. The unpredictability of the whole thing is, well, predictable. Deployments will come when you don’t expect them – and they will be canceled if you are counting on them. There’s no such thing as normal business hours. At any moment you could be told to move to a completely new place. Surprise! You’re going to big-fat-middle-of-nowhere.

But it’s become not enough. So here we are – itching for a new adventure.

There are a few reasons for this. For Luke, life in the military has become a little too predictable in its drudgery. For the last 10 years he has mostly loved what he has been allowed to do. Deploy, train, field time. But the next 10 year probably don’t look like that. Instead, they include a lot of time behind a desk, filing unreal amounts of paperwork.

No.

He wants to lead people. He wants to have a meaningful impact on individual lives. He wants to get out there and make a difference.

And then there’s the mental health cost of military service for which we have already paid the price. As a family, we simply have nothing more to give.

Still, we could just keep on doing what we are doing. That’s the easy thing, and plenty of people operate that way. There’s nothing really wrng with it. It probably wouldn’t kill us. We’d have orders to move to Alabama this coming summer. We’d keep our cushy life. At halfway to a rather wonderful military retirement, we’d be setting ourselves up for financial success later. And then we could pursue our passions. You know, later. Someday. Eventually.

Or.

We could take this next big step  — and go on a new adventure entirely.

Plenty of people talk about selling most of their stuff and starting over. Few ever actually do it.

But that is what we are going to.  It’ll probably get messy. It’ll probably be ugly sometimes. It probably won’t be predictable or cushy.

But it’ll be right.

We are going to get out of the active duty military. We are going to sell the majority of our stuff. We are going to move as far across the country as we can – Luke is applying to graduate school and will (hopefully) be choosing between programs in rural Washington State or Alaska (I’m pulling for Alaska).

We’re going to change everything we can about our lives and start over.

Live.

Breathe.

Go.

Experience.

Be a little uncomfortable.

Learn to be OK with it.

And we want you to come along for the ride. We’ll be blogging and sharing the whole crazy process all over our Humans Outside social media. Because what’s the point of an adventure if you can’t take someone else with you?

3 Responses

  1. Congratulations on that huge decision! I’m guessing Luke is in the same year group as Nick, based on years to retirement and next Army career steps. We made the very difficult decision last September to stay in, rather that get out, at the ten year mark. That decision is still so fresh on my mind and heart that I can relate to — and I admire the decision to — leaving this life behind in favor of something totally and completely different. For our family, staying in is the right decision. I hope that the next steps that are right for your family are gratifying and challenging and all the things you hope they are! Good luck! I’ll look forward to watching some of your adventures unfold through your blog and social media.

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