“I’m going to buy 15 acres of land in Vermont and start a homestead,” he said to me. His eyes were electric, a light shade of blue sparkling in the bright East Dorset sun.
I smiled back at him beaming and gave him a congratulatory pat on the shoulder. “I couldn’t be more happy for you.”
Would you give up everything to pursue a dream?
My eyes are drooping, but my mind is alive.
I caught a red-eye flight this morning from LAX to Albany, NY and find myself typing on my computer at 11pm in East Dorset, Vermont (and if you know anything about me, this is a far distant world from the sunny California coast that I am used to). I’m on vacation for 10 days, to attend my younger cousin’s wedding over the weekend and then I’m off to Maine for a week. I don’t get to the East Coast often so I’m excited. The trees are just starting to shift into their fall attire – light shades of yellow, orange and red – shedding their bright summer greens.
For me personally, this is a special family wedding I’m attending. It not only marks the celebration of the beginning of a new life together for two amazing people that I love dearly, but more importantly, it symbolizes a metaphorical acceptance of an alternative lifestyle that was not always well received in my family.
Living an alternative lifestyle is facing an uphill battle.
You see, my cousin never fit into the 9 to 5 world. He is one of those free spirits that cannot be caged and needs to stick to his internal compass, which doesn’t always lead in a direction that people can understand. He is the quintessential essence of the journeyman. And when you pick a path in life that is in opposition to what mainstream society views as traditional, you’re always facing an uphill battle – constantly explaining yourself and defending your lifestyle to people who can’t grasp the vision that you are trying to achieve.
I know because I have watched him grow into the incredible man he has become. But it didn’t always start out this way…
My cousin began his young life as most other millennials do – he took out college loans and attended a private university that he couldn’t afford. To the dismay of his parents, he didn’t pursue a traditional career after graduating, rather choosing to travel and fill his life with fulfilling experiences instead. (And this isn’t a harp on the conventional lifestyle nor an endorsement for in the moment living, but rather an acknowledgement that there is a whole range of possibilities that one can choose.)
After several years of trying different things (ranging from building a house, couch surfing, carpentry for beehives, leading rafting tours down the Grand Canyon, running a flower business and holing up in a yurt for an entire Vermont winter) he finally settled on farming.
Agriculture was a natural fit for him, living off the land with his bare hands and practicing sustainable growing to lower his carbon footprint in the world. He had found his calling, and although you could see that he was both happy and progressing in his new endeavors, his family was still struggling to support him and accept this alternative lifestyle. What about your student loans? Is this really what you want to do with your life? You aren’t getting any younger?
But to his credit, he put his head down and stuck with it. When his parents would question what he was doing, he would simply tell them that he had a plan and work that much harder toward the life that he had envisioned. It was hard to deny that, that smile stretched from cheek to cheek across his face represented anything in the realm of a wrong decision or mistake.
And finally, as many people eventually tend to do, our family came around and shifted their perspective. Instead of challenging him, they slowly began to support him in pursuing his dream – the dream that I mentioned in the beginning of this post – a 15-acre Vermont homestead just waiting to be embarked upon (that is, after I finish celebrating his wedding with him tomorrow night).
Why do people defend a traditional lifestyle that doesn’t make them happy?
As I was reflecting upon my cousin’s journey, I could see that there were many similar parallels that can be drawn from his story and my FI journey. We are both pursuing unorthodox ventures that make people uncomfortable. If your profession or life path, doesn’t fit into a nice gift-wrapped box, but is rather skewed, mottled and webbed with unpopular sentiments; then people don’t know what to do with you. They don’t like things they don’t understand, because it is easier to dismiss something in judgement rather than take the time to unpack its meaning.
And I am guilty of this as well. When my cousin was still drifting in his early years, I was one of those outsiders questioning him and pointing my finger – what would he do for a retirement? When would he finally settle down and get his shit together?
Like him, I have changed and matured over the years, but I still have a long way to go. When he was telling me about his 15-acre homestead, I wanted to reach out and tell him about my own FI journey as well, that I might be able to help him work the land on his property in the future when I hit my FI date. But I didn’t.
I couldn’t.
I knew that he would have understood immediately the significance of what I was doing, but I’m still so used to bottling up my FI story that I haven’t figured out the best way to express it. The courage is there, but the words to communicate it are still developing. Because it has to be done precisely, like a surgeon operating. If you rush it or make the slightest error, then people retreat to envy, or resent what you are trying to accomplish. Because they too want to break free from the chains of a normal existence, yet haven’t found their own fortitude to look their life in the mirror.
And this is a perfect example of how much I still need to learn, progress and grow to embrace the decisions I have made. Not worry what others think and just stick to my plan. But it’s hard. A lot harder than people might think to get over those social stereotypes that have been implanted in our minds for so long.
I know my cousin like me, doesn’t have all the answers. He still probably has some college debt and no idea what he’s going to do for a retirement. But he’s at peace with it. And that’s the point. Embrace the journey. Accept the challenges along the way. Seek out the best version of yourself today and things have a way of working out. I constantly remind myself that it is never about the destination, that doesn’t exist. There is only the process.
When I say goodbye to him this weekend, I’ll give him a huge hug, look him in the eyes and tell him how proud of him I am. But I won’t tell him thus far about my future plans, those are still for me to ponder and perfect.
The time will come.
But not yet…
Because my journey has just begun.
-Q-FI
Leave a Reply