Three Year Itch.
Three years ago, pretty much this weekend, I moved to Toronto.
The plan was to get acclimated to the city, relax, buy a house and let the future unfold. I was also planning on attending Bikram Yoga Teacher Training that Fall in Las Vegas.
But life changed.
It was mostly due to us buying the house. I freaked out about buying something so expensive and being in debt. And the only income was going to be The Husband's. We hadn't been in debt before as a couple. The Husband hadn't ever been in debt before in his life. (Me, though. I was very experienced with small debt.) But being in a new city, with a new mortgage... I turned into a stressball.
"Dude," The Husband said. "Chill out. Everything will be fine."
"Fine?" I asked. "How can you be sure? What if something happens to you? I can't rely on you to carry the weight for this."
So, as anyone who knows me could have predicted... I went in search of a job. And it only took me three weeks to find one. And it was a good job. One that allowed me to grow even more than I had in a few years. But after two years, I got restless.
Not with what I was doing day-to-day. But with my salary and my ability to provide for my husband. So explored opportunities in New York and Boston... Two cities I had lived in before and absolutely adored.
"It will be nice to live in one of them again and have a better work-life balance than I have now," I told myself.
"Do you really think you're going to have a better balance in NYC?" The Husband asked. "Last time you lived there, all you did was work."
"Yes, exactly," I said to him. "It's a different culture in the work world there. People work non-stop and they love it. I want to go back to that."
He was supportive, as usual, and pushed me along this adventure. I landed a job. I found an apartment. I created my own world. I planned to get healthy and become more focused and inspired than I was. And most importantly, I was going to be able to afford my life in NYC as well as build a nest-egg to help support my couple life.
Or so I thought.
All I've done here since arriving is work. I've attempted a few yoga challenges, hoping to revive my energy. But have failed miserably at them.
I head to work each morning at about 8:30am, and arrive about an hour before most people on my team. Actually, before most people at the agency. I sometimes remember to eat lunch. But subsist mostly on coffee during the day. I try to leave work by 6pm at the latest... But often find myself at my desk till about 7:30pm. And by then, all I want to do is go home and eat something.
For the most part, I am pretty happy with this. It was exactly what I was looking for with this move.
But now, three years after making my decision to dive back into work (even though that wasn't the plan), I find myself wondering what it would be like to not work. Sure, I've had "not working" stints before in my life. But never with the ease of not having to worry about money as much, because we've paid the house down to a point where I don't worry about it.
Plus, the house down the street sold for about 32% more than what my neighbors paid for it 6 months before we bought ours. So if money becomes an issue, I am confident we could get more for the house than what we paid.
Knowing this make the idea of trying to explore other interests actually feasible for me. Three years ago, it was "nice in theory."
The plan was to get acclimated to the city, relax, buy a house and let the future unfold. I was also planning on attending Bikram Yoga Teacher Training that Fall in Las Vegas.
But life changed.
It was mostly due to us buying the house. I freaked out about buying something so expensive and being in debt. And the only income was going to be The Husband's. We hadn't been in debt before as a couple. The Husband hadn't ever been in debt before in his life. (Me, though. I was very experienced with small debt.) But being in a new city, with a new mortgage... I turned into a stressball.
"Dude," The Husband said. "Chill out. Everything will be fine."
"Fine?" I asked. "How can you be sure? What if something happens to you? I can't rely on you to carry the weight for this."
So, as anyone who knows me could have predicted... I went in search of a job. And it only took me three weeks to find one. And it was a good job. One that allowed me to grow even more than I had in a few years. But after two years, I got restless.
Not with what I was doing day-to-day. But with my salary and my ability to provide for my husband. So explored opportunities in New York and Boston... Two cities I had lived in before and absolutely adored.
"It will be nice to live in one of them again and have a better work-life balance than I have now," I told myself.
"Do you really think you're going to have a better balance in NYC?" The Husband asked. "Last time you lived there, all you did was work."
"Yes, exactly," I said to him. "It's a different culture in the work world there. People work non-stop and they love it. I want to go back to that."
He was supportive, as usual, and pushed me along this adventure. I landed a job. I found an apartment. I created my own world. I planned to get healthy and become more focused and inspired than I was. And most importantly, I was going to be able to afford my life in NYC as well as build a nest-egg to help support my couple life.
Or so I thought.
All I've done here since arriving is work. I've attempted a few yoga challenges, hoping to revive my energy. But have failed miserably at them.
I head to work each morning at about 8:30am, and arrive about an hour before most people on my team. Actually, before most people at the agency. I sometimes remember to eat lunch. But subsist mostly on coffee during the day. I try to leave work by 6pm at the latest... But often find myself at my desk till about 7:30pm. And by then, all I want to do is go home and eat something.
For the most part, I am pretty happy with this. It was exactly what I was looking for with this move.
But now, three years after making my decision to dive back into work (even though that wasn't the plan), I find myself wondering what it would be like to not work. Sure, I've had "not working" stints before in my life. But never with the ease of not having to worry about money as much, because we've paid the house down to a point where I don't worry about it.
Plus, the house down the street sold for about 32% more than what my neighbors paid for it 6 months before we bought ours. So if money becomes an issue, I am confident we could get more for the house than what we paid.
Knowing this make the idea of trying to explore other interests actually feasible for me. Three years ago, it was "nice in theory."
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