Two Year Anniversary

It's been two years to the day since I quit my last "real" job. Back then I worked in a windowless green room with four others in gray-green cubicles surrounded by storage boxes, binders, and fluorescent lighting.

Two years later, I have traveled over fifty thousand miles, set foot on three continents, and today, eaten my way through a lovely dessert festival in my medieval village in Umbria. I wake up to a stunning view, and every evening, enjoy a stunning sunset. Friends come and go, and this place changes their lives too.

Lots of people wonder how I do what I'm doing. To my amusement, many assume I have independent wealth (the answer is, I have none in my pocket, a plethora in my life). Last year, I made a fraction of what I made two years ago (all right, so I only worked three months). But it's all I needed to take five months to live in a foreign village. If you think about it, it likely costs me less to live here than it does for you to live there. I eat local produce, frugally use the natural resources available to me, and I take public transportation.

Life is made up of choices. You choose where you go or you choose where you stay. You choose to work in a place or to leave it, to listen to your heart or to follow the bank. You see my mantra on the column to the right? Life is what you make of it. I know I'm in charge and so are you. We just have to act like it.