Stuck between two cliches…

My life is stuck between 2 clichés at the moment; never put off until tomorrow what you can do today and nothing ventured, nothing gained. The irony of it all is that I know I need to cross the line that keeps me in my comfort zone yet I keep telling myself that there’s always tomorrow; that mythical day that never arrives.

I have often imagined my dream life and the person I would be in it. Yet, when faced with the choice of doing what it will take or doing what I normally do, I tell myself that it’s just ‘one last day of bad eating because I’ll fix it tomorrow.’ The only problem is tomorrow is about a decade overdue. It never came.

Do you put yourself out there and do what you’ve always wanted to do or stay on the hamster wheel? ‘I’ll write tomorrow.’ ‘I’ll start my photography on the weekend.’ ‘I’ll work on my craft at some point but right now I have to do this other thing.’ The list of creative excuses is endless. I’ve made them all.

The intention when I started this blog was to find my way home; no small project by any stretch of the imagination. Emigrating is not for the faint hearted. It’s not simply a case of picking a destination on the map and heading off to pastures new. Nothing stays the same when you emigrate.

To do this is going to take an indestructible willpower and the resources to get it done.

While most of us are stuck in a scarcity mentality there really is no need to be. We live in an infinite universe if we’re only willing to see it; instead we see lack because that’s what we’re focused on finding. The resources are there, the means to do this are all there. There’s a BUT here. The resources are there BUT they are outside of my comfort zone. If I want to fund this endeavor, this is going to mean finding alternative flows of income to supplement the one I already have. It might involve making money doing something I’ve always dreamed of doing yet never grew the balls to try in case I failed.

To win the prize I need to venture outside of my safe zone into the unknown. If you will not venture there you cannot expect to gain. At my core I know this to be a fundamental truth. This isn’t the first time tackling emigration. So why I can’t I remember what pushed me to succeed the last two times? What was the catalyst that propelled me out of the paddling pool into the ocean?

Instead I’m consciously putting off until tomorrow things I need to do now. Why do we do that? We know what we need to do, yet we resist. We want to change our situation yet we simultaneously fear changing. We want the situation to change while wanting ourselves to stay the same.

Wherever you go you take yourself with you. The scenery might look different but the view will be the same. Your view on the world will not change if you do not change. It really is that simple. Expecting your life to change when you hold the same limited view of it is a bit like expecting to see a different view out of your window just because you changed the glass.

Growth demands we venture out of what we know into what we don’t know in order to learn something new. Sure, it’s risky. Change always is but risk and fear are not synonymous and maybe that’s the clue.

Author: MacScottie

I'm a South African-born American who dabbles in writing, photography and cookery. I lived in England for 6 years before moving to America. My first trip to Scotland was in 2003 and it was love at first sight. 4 trips later & I'm now on a quest to find a way back to my soul-home in Scotland. I've picked up favourite foods in each place I've lived so I'm a product of all the places I've been. A sprinkling of this, a dash of that and in an emergency, a generous splash of Scotch!

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