Garden of the Gods, Colorado Springs – Colorado, U.S.A. Years ago, when I first started blogging, I created a website with the tagline, “Keep Moving.” The slogan captured both my reality and aspiration–to never stop, to always be going somewhere, doing something. It reflected my commitment to staying active, but also a certain restlessness and anxiety about standing still.
Because it’s Always Related to Childhood
Decades earlier, as an over-achieving, second-generation Army brat, I loathed immobility. In my child’s mind that divided the world into good and bad, inertia was anathema to all that was good. Personal and physical growth, persistence, productivity–these were baked into the foundation of my developing life philosophy. Relocation, the ultimate expression of a kinetic lifestyle was a familiar and honorable lever. To keep moving was what I knew.
At seven-years-old, while riding with my family in our red Dodge Caravan near Ft. Sill, Oklahoma, I remarked with a sweeping gesture of my arm that an empty field we were passing needed growth. Where were the buildings and development, I asked peevishly? I was a little progress evangelist–quite unlike my more laid back younger brothers–a junior officer in the march toward advancement. I kind of still am.
Fear and Hesitation in Miami
Nearly a year ago, Jabu and I decided to relocate from our home of nearly five years in Miami to Denver. It was his idea, really. I was unsure if I could leave the coast–the smell of the ocean makes me all giddy–and wondered if we should move abroad. In the end, a birthday excursion to the Northern Rockies drew me in. Denver came packaged with mountains. We targeted May for our relocation. It was November.
Not wanting to skip a beat, I started searching for work in Denver immediately, and immediately, I found it. It was perfect–I’d be able to remain in my field and continue progressing along my chosen career track. I’d lose no time between my current and new jobs and would gain a smart new team of colleagues doing important work for a high-growth, venture-backed technology startup, in a city that was booming. I could not have asked for more.
Except that, for years, I had been asking for more; rather, I longed for something different. I’d even begun working with a career counselor who joked that my hankering for mid-life career transition was straight out of a textbook and right on time. But, I was terrified of trying something new. I had a good salary, benefits, stock options, advancement opportunity, some semblance of security. I was finally able to travel as I wanted, to take up hobbies, to spoil my nieces and nephews. Pressing the restart button would be soul-crushing, career suicide for sure.
Without a doubt, behind my zeal for growth was an equally powerful fear of not moving–of being stuck, moving backward, or being removed from the playing field altogether.
So I shelved the dream of something new–it wasn’t the first time–and moved to Denver. I started that dope new job, which was kind of a continuation of my previous job, and I kept moving.
The Thing About Colorado
With Jabu remaining in Miami for several months to finish out a contract, I moved to Denver alone. It was the dead of winter. My arrival coincided with a snow storm. The land was dormant, but for me, it was spring because everything was new–house, job, car, city and state, climate and altitude, the line of mountains outside of my window.
Solitude has a way of enhancing perception and blunting the distractions that prevent us from seeing what is right in front of us. Away from the familiar, my senses were alert to all of the newness and I began, again, to want the same for my career.
I think it had a little to do with the mountains.
Here’s the thing about Colorado: All at once, it’s fast and slow, active and leisurely. The mountains compel you to adventure and discovery, while their beauty inspires silence, awe, and stillness. Vigorous and outgoing living give rise to slow, intentional reverence for the surroundings–or the other way around. In any case, movement and stillness are one here; they are complementary.
Pausing my career to explore new options was suddenly no longer daunting; it was imperative to growth. What I’m learning here in Colorado is that, sometimes, the best way to continue on is to pause.
When Life Throws You Detours
The irony here, of course, is that detours, diversion, discovery of the new and unknown are my jams. When I’m traveling for fun, I love to lose my way, to get off track. I guess detours are not so easy when they disrupt your life and career. Life detours take time to ease into and inflict a little pain and discomfort.
“Almost everything will work again if you unplug it for a few minutes, including you.” -Anne Lamott
Right now, I’m living the ultimate detour. I left the cool new job–it was the right thing to do–and am trying some new things, remembering the old things I love most, and retooling. I’m exploring my new home state and taking photographs of its spectacular landscape, training to hike a “14er” (mountain with a summit at 14,000 feet above sea level, or higher), burning through my Goodreads shelves, and writing. I’m following the bends of this new side road and taking my time.
Several years ago, a mentor sent me a handwritten note encouraging me to pursue congruence between life and work and inquiring, “what could you possibly fear?”
Nothing, I’d tell him today. I fear nothing.
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