Friday, March 2, 2012

This is a Must-Read Post

No, not this, my post, but this THIS post.  It was written by one of my favorite bloggers, Nancy, who along with her husband and kids biked from Alaska to Argentina when her kids were ten years old.
Anyway the reason this post is so important is that I was thinking about this very topic a couple of weeks ago.  Specifically, when I was in the hospital, a bunch of doctors came to see me--from the ER doc to a cardiologist and neurologist--and one of the first things they asked me was "what do you do?".  I guess in our society, one must actually do something but alas, I haven't done much of anything for a little over a year so I told them that I had been traveling with my husband for over a year so I didn't really do anything now.
All of them were impressed and most of them commented along the lines of 'I wish I could do that' and the thing that struck me when they said that was that this person standing in front of me makes 40 TIMES what I do per year and the thought of long-term travel is something that is in the wish category for them!?.
Which is what Nancy's post is all about.  While I don't want all of the cardiologists and neurologist to quit working and hit the road--that would be a disaster for all of us--I do want EVERYONE to realize that you can literally do anything you want to do if you follow Nancy's Four P's of Living Your Dreams.  And your dreams don't necessarily need to involve world travel.  You might want to become a wood worker or just take more time off to spend with your kids or you might want to start a non-profit or you might want to open your own business or you might just want to escape to the beach by yourself for a week but whatever it is that you want to do, know that you can do it.
Now if someone would have told me this ten years ago I would have said "yeah, right!" and probably laughed at the absurdity of it.  I mean, I have been working full time since I was 16 years old.  There was no rest for the weary or dead broke, so in my mind, there was no way I would ever be able to lead a life of leisure--more or less--because I was swamped with debt and swamped with doubt.  I knew exactly no one who was doing anything different than what I was doing--work, spend money, buy stuff on credit, work more to pay the credit card bills, buy a new car because you deserve it for all of your hard work, work some more to pay the car payment, etc.
Then a whole bunch of things happened, namely I started listening to Dave Ramsey three hours a day, and that got the ball rolling.  I realized that you could do a whole bunch of things if you weren't saddled with debt.  Then I started reading a bunch of blogs like Nancy's and I realized that once you put yourself in a debt free position, you could actually do more than you ever thought.
So I hope you will take the time to read Nancy's post, think about your dreams, then get busy making them come true!

1 comment:

  1. I love that! A doctor saying "I wish I could do that"!! I am an aged care nurse (havent worked in over a year!) and I was shocked to hear how many residents said the very same thing..."If only I had travelled when I was younger".
    I even nursed an elderly man who was only in his late 60's who had severe Dementia, and his wife said they had always planed to travel when he retired but he soon needed nursing care and they never got to have his dream.
    Its really important to dream big, and to act on that dream!
    Thanks for sharing - hope you are feeling better?
    Cheers
    Lisa

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