Recently a young guy I just met at the meditation center asked me, what do you do?
I said I am traveling and trying to deepen my meditation practice.
He asked why wasn’t I working and I replied that “I don’t feel like working”. It was an honest answer. The guy then responded that this whole quitting to travel is a bit overrated.
It was a presumptuous statement loaded with judgement. Sigh! But I get it. In recent times, there is so much emphasis on “Zindagi na milegi dobara”, so go backpacking around Europe kinda agenda that’s being shoved down peoples noses that one has to really stop and investigate.
But why does one not question the point of working for a ‘paid’ job. Nobody ever asks you, why are you working in a so and so job. If my answer to him was that “I work in HR”, I can guarantee there would be no follow-up opinions, judgements or questions.
So why is it that human race seems to have concluded that the only thing that is worthwhile doing is a job that pays you? And, how much pay or bank balance is then enough to stop doing it?
I personally haven’t quit my job with the intention of travelling, or to play music or meditate. I quit it because I simply stopped enjoying it anymore and it was time to find something that I loved doing. There might be a time again in future when I want to go back to work, but at this moment, I didn’t want to. I sure wasn’t going to lie on my death bed wishing I made more money for a company that already makes millions, or miss firing another round of employees simply because a company wants to squeeze more profits. What is the point of doing something that you did not enjoy?
Life comes with a fixed number of hours and that hour glass aint takin a break. But the way the human mind is conditioned, we have to work for pay to feel worthwhile. Or as another young friend put it, ‘you will be more productive’ when you work. Or that we have to be proactive and do something rather than passively wait for things to happen.
No one ever asks, why is doing more important than being? There seems to be an underlying assumption of not doing something, i.e. paid or maybe even unpaid work as laziness, or taking an easy route. But, have you ever tried not to do anything and to simply be? I mean, not even spend your days watching netflix, like not do anything. If not, I dare ya!
Something that has never failed me is following my own intuition as a guide. If something felt right, I did it, regardless of whether that made sense or not. When people hear this, there is almost always an underlying conclusion that your intuition only asks you to do wild things, aka go bungee jumping or volunteering in Africa or yoga in the Himalayas or cycling in the valleys of Europe. Sure, those activities are on bucket lists of people that work on setting goals for themselves and feeling a sense of achievement. But I believe that following your intuition as a guide has nothing to do with a bucket list. On the contrary, a bucket list goes against the very essence of listening to your own inner voice. And sure, I did end up doing a lot of wild things, but not because they were on my list, but precisely because I had no list.
There are times my intuition simply led me into a corporate role, where I drudged on long hours in my classic workaholic perfectionist mode. And, while I worked, I did so because I absolutely enjoyed working those jobs. Weird, hell yes! But I do not regret those jobs because my inner voice led me to those. In turn, those roles gave me financial freedom, understanding of my own personality traits and capabilities, an innate confidence in my abilities, and in some cases, lifelong friends.
We are conditioned since childhood to follow the herd. To look outward on what we need vs listening to our own inner voice. For a lot of people, this is the sort of stuff that sounds wishy washy, or as my dearest English mate calls ‘psycho babbling’.
As strange as it may sound though, we all know what it is. Do you remember that moment when you know something with an absolute sense of certainty. Like, not just understanding it or thinking it, but knowing it. How many times have we not heard, ‘I have laid eyes on so and so and immediately I ‘knew’ we were meant to be together.’ Most people only see knowing in the context of relationships, but it goes way beyond.
The thing with intuition is, the more you listen to it, the stronger it becomes. I often get comments like, how is it that you find a job whenever you want to? Interestingly, it’s the wrong way of looking at it. I don’t bother looking for one unless my inner voice guides me to, and when that happens, a job always shows up. A lot of people are tired of looking for a job for months and even years. To me, the answer is, they were not meant to be working at that point of time and it is fear or insecurity that is driving them to look for a job.
Don’t get me wrong. I do know there are circumstances which make having a paid job a nonoptional thing. i.e. feeding a family, paying rent and bills, having the financial freedom to be able to make your own choices etc. And I do know the absolute helplessness of wanting a job and not finding one too. And, neither do I have the courage to put myself in a position of going broke and lose my financial freedom. But, over the years, I have realised that there is a time and place for everything. I could stress myself out for 6 months trying to find that job or listen to my inner voice and wait out those 6 months doing things that I love. Either way, if that job wasn’t meant to show up for me until 6 months, it aint coming to me even a day earlier by stressing about it. I dont mean to trivialise the pursuit by any means. We live in a society that makes survival difficult. But once you start looking within, our perpective on what matters evolves.
There is another point that gets missed in following the intuition. That somehow, it has to result in blessedly happy times. Why else would you do it, i.e. take the plunge to follow your inner voice against all odds. But, if that is what you think this is about, I have news for you! Your intuition is the best teacher, and the lessons it picks aren’t always the most comfortable ones. But what it surely leads to, is a memorable, enriching life. Personally, I follow my intuition out of curiosity, because more often than not, I have zero clue what comes out of it.
This last year, my inner voice resisted all attempts to work. The very thought of it made me squirm. So, I chose to focus on traveling, meditating, practicing music. It meant I wasn’t living the most comfortable lifestyle trying to live within a budget. But the point of learning for me was to understand my own discomfort, what is driving it and my reaction to it. I won’t profess that I succeeded at owning my discomfort at all times, but I certainly succeeded in being aware of it and trying my best to work with it. I pushed my own limits of discomfort and put myself in situations which my saner self would have considered unwise. And yet, it was one of the most beautiful and enriching experience. It lead me to some beautiful relationships and experience a level of affection and warmth that I cherish more than any amount of $ in the bank.
Why would you knowingly put yourself through discomfort you ask? To me, the way the soul grows is by learning and stretching our own ideas and boundaries of comfort vs discomfort, pain vs pleasure. And nothing can be a better guide for the growth of one’s soul than to follow your inner guidance. The test in this case was how comfortable I would become with being uncomfortable.
It is also interesting, albeit less amusing to watch the way people judge you when you choose not to work. The subtle shift in the way people speak with you, not necessarily a conscious one. As a society, we are conditioned to respect work, authority, position and status. And when you choose to get off that grid, those around you are still trying to get a frame of reference of what level of respect you now deserve vis a vis them. Do I now deserve the same level of respect as when I was heading a division making 1000s of $ every week, or my living on cheaper rentals and throwing myself at the mercy of friends with ambiguous travel lessen my entitlement to respect. If I do deserve a lesser degree of respect, how much less in terms of proportion? I am not saying people become disrespectful overnight or actively ask these questions in their conscious mind. But the subconscious mind is a different beast and inbuilt biases are a real thing. Unless one is really aware of their own self and actively unlearn, and even then, it is a long road. Thankfully, my selfworth is too grounded to be shaken, and having a family that has my back helps. But, if you do choose to go down the path, do so with the awareness of what you are willing to let go.
Is it easy to follow intuition? It is kind of a loaded question. Personally, I find it difficult to live a life that goes against my intuition. But there are times when the intuition simply goes quiet, leaving you wondering what next? It’s during these quiet times that the biggest struggle happens. Feeling lost is an overwhelming feeling. But then again, how many that follow the worldly ways have made it without ever feeling lost.
Personally, I believe it takes a lot of courage to live a life without attachments, without security, without a fall back option. I am not there yet and I doubt I’ll ever get there. But, I have a renewed respect for those spirited enough to abandon all safety nets and live life moment to moment, and do things their heart guides them to. May their tribe grow!
