Forty Shades of Green and Gold
This past December I hit the big 40 with the coming and going of my latest birthday. It’s crazy to think that I’ve been on earth for 4 decades now and how my life has changed over the years. So why not ramble on a bit in this post as a way of seeing what I want to accomplish in the next 40 years.
I started writing on this site back in 2014, but I’d been writing on Blogger and WordPress for years before that. Stupidly I deleted everything I wrote before, thinking that it was best consigned to the dumpster. Now I actually regret that, as much as most of my posts were rather banal, they are still a valuable look into my thinking and life and it’s always good to look back and see how you’ve grown.
So in 2014 I decided to grab a URL for my own site and installed WordPress and started writing. and I wrote a grand total of 41 posts in 2014. Unfortunately my posts would decrease with each passing year, which is a sign of how my life became increasingly complicated and various personal issues made it necessary to take a break from life online and focus on myself.
But in the last year or so I’ve decided that I need to focus more seriously on my writing. after all, I have always been itching to move into writing as a long term “career”.
My first big realization at hitting 40 is just how different my career path has been. When I was growing up I always saw a job as something you study for, get, and then stay in until you retire. but the world has changed, and it’s more important that ever to keep on learning and branching out into new things. Upskilling is the trendy term to describe that and it’s easy to see how I’ve had to do that with a career in accounting, moving into teaching and with my fingers in various writing and streaming endeavours.
So I know that in the next decades of my life I’ll be changing careers sooner rather than later. I’m very tempted to start looking at making my passions more of a business and not just idle hobbies. i want to make the most of my time now so that in time I can retire and enjoy good sunset years.
On a more personal level I’m also far removed from the person I was, even back in 2014. I was always a shy and introverted kid and while I am still very much an introvert, I’ve had to become more outgoing and proactive as part of my job. Teaching after all is a very “performance” based profession. you’re always front and centre in the classroom and need to be a child psychologist to figure out how to get the most out of your students while ensuring their mental health as a growing young person are in good shape.
Personally I’ve had some rough years recently, but the good news is that over the last 2 or 3 years I’ve finally found a happy place for myself. Despite 2020 ruining everything, I am still positive as I have very good support from those closest to me. Years back I may not have been in such a good place and for that I am very grateful that I no longer have that sadness or negativity in my life.
So what do i want from the next 40 years? I want to be happy looking on what I’ve accomplished. I know that i have a lot more to offer and that I haven’t done nearly enough with the talents I have. I want to solidify my personal relationships and improve myself. I know that I still have a lot of room to improve and I want to make those first steps. I also want to become less active online and I’ve actually been thinking about dropping Facebook and Twitter and just leaving up a minimal presence on the Fediverse.
This site will remain the main way I keep updating about where I am and what I’m doing and I hope that in another 40 years I’ll still be here writing about all the crazy adventure I’ll surely get up to.
And as always, thanks for reading and coming along for the ride.
I’m publishing this as part of 100 Days To Offload. You can join in yourself by visiting https://100daystooffload.com.