The creative manner in which a couple I met recently are redirecting their lives captured my attention. He has a passion for grapes, and she adores cooking. Both of them enjoy entertaining. So, it seems a natural step, after having retired from mainstream careers, for them to have conceived and built a marvelous home/winery on a beautiful Oregon hillside where he has planted and tended grapes during his spare time over the last 20 years, and to use their new home to earn a living cooking, entertaining, and sipping wine from their own north 40 (they describe their business as "a Bed and Breakfast without the Bs") .
Recently, I gave notice of my intent to quit my job in order to go back to school. I've thought a lot about what I love, noting what I do when I don't have to do anything, and pondering how to combine the two. I write a lot for my own entertainment. I goof around on the computer. And I read constantly. I have yet to figure out how to create my own winery from all of this, but the only way I know to get from where I am to where I want to be (even if the details are a bit obscure) is to put one foot in front of the other. At work I'm trying to get my desk cleaned up... case plans closed, file drawers purged, everything caught up and no mess for coverage workers or the new hire to inherit. Brand spanking total organization. Last night as I drove home from work, ideas rattled around in my head regarding the futility of perfectionism. My friend Mary had something to say to me about that, i.e., that I can only do what my manager will allow to happen, and let the rest go.
On my way out the door tonight, I glanced at the great heaps of undone filing in a co-worker's cubicle. I've found that style of working doesn't suit me well. While my coworker saves menial tasks for later, speeding ahead of me on to the next project, I find it helpful to my overall effectiveness to plod through my filing and case notes immediately. Her performance demonstrates that one can certainly operate successfully with filing undone, but for me, "later" never seems to come because something else always seems more urgent (and a LOT less tedious) than going back to tidy up the no-longer-relevant debris of some forgotten task. And the later "later" arrives, the more repugnant the chore (and the more likely I am to avoid it).
I try to aim toward working that way at home, as well. Wash the oatmeal pan before I eat my oatmeal. "Later" finds it hard and dry and needing to be soaked until yet later. Ultimately, by the time "yet later" rolls around, I've learned that I've generally allowed something to develop that I wish I'd dealt with sooner. So, I tell myself not to rush, to take time to put one foot in front of the other. Multitask, but use a timer so I don't burn the house down (I am cooking oatmeal as I write this, and the first pan of water was nearly sizzling when I remembered it just minutes ago and leapt out of bed--my favorite place to write--and barely managed to snatch it from a scorching finish). Must work on mindfulness. What did I do with my pen when I bolted in such haste? Did I take it with me and put it down in the kitchen? Did I drop it in my bed? It's gone now. Note to self: practice mindfulness (later, of course) before I run out of pens.
When a client expresses doubt over her ability to achieve a goal, I brainstorm with her about how to divide a distant objective into smaller steps, or milestones, and then break those down even further into attainable baby steps. At this point in my development, it seems to me that the daily discipline of tending those grapes, sticking with those baby steps, that filing, those oatmeal pans, and keeping track of those pens not only leads to achievement of the ultimate goal, but is the ultimate goal. We become who we are, our life's design found in its daily details. And all of that has something to do with my having quit my job, despite the allure of a steady paycheck and medical insurance, shackled to whatever daily hell one must endure to earn them.
And all of that led me to write this. I don't know if I have anything worthwhile to say or if I have the discipline to do it on a regular basis. But I can do it today. So... cheers!
P.S. To anyone else contemplating career change, I recommend an inspiring book that was recommended to me on the topic, Callings: Finding and Following an Authentic Life by Greg Levoy.
