Follow Your Own Compass
Currently I am reading, Adventures for your Soul: 21 Ways to Transform Your Habits and Reach your Full Potential by Shannon Kaiser. About 3 chapters in I read something that hit incredibly close to home and I had to share. In regards to societal norms and standards, Kaiser writes:
"This means that if you are a woman above size 6 or 8, you consider yourself fat; or if you are above a certain age and single, you think you're a loser; or if you don't want kids, there is something wrong with you; or that if you want to take time off from work or school to travel, you are avoiding responsibility. Well, I'm here to tell you, none of this is true...."
Story time.
About 2 years ago, I had someone close to me tell me almost word for word what Kaiser wrote about travel. I was told that I was only traveling to run away from the fact that I didn't have a plan for my life. At the time, I was a college drop out, working an office job that I hated and saving for my next big trip. Hearing someone close to me talk down at me and my desire to travel hurt me beyond explanation, but ultimately didn't change the fact that traveling was my plan, still is actually, and I wasn't going to let one persons opinion change that. I know that the course I've chosen to take for my life is not what the standard course is and I am more than okay with that. I have learned more, seen more, and met more people in the years since I dropped out of college than I ever would have had I stayed on the traditional course. That sense of acceptance has come over time, once I really learned how to not let other peoples opinions affect the choices I make.
Kaiser also writes, shortly after the passage above,
"...you have your own unique compass, and aligning with your inner desires is the only way to true joy."
So as a girl who has been following her own unique compass (the one in my head and heart, not a physical compass. I have gotten myself hopelessly lost any time I have tried to use a physical compass) I'd like to remind who ever is reading this that life is different for everyone. There are a million roads to take and no road is superior to the next.
Buy the plane ticket.
Start the blog.
Change you career path.
Make that cross country move.
Start that fitness journey.
Take a leap, even if it is scary.
Follow your compass.
Forget what other people may tell you and follow the path that makes your heart happy and fills you with joy.
