The Joys of Temporary Living
Chances are that if you have read through this site you have seen me mention the joys of living independently without taking on all the “baggage” at a young age. Minimizing expenses, obligations, and dependents so that you are able to go all in on the things that you truly want to do in life. Avoiding the entrapments that so many people get bogged down with early on.
Ultimately, all things in life are temporary. Many people avoid this reality by placing excessive significance and dependence on things outside of themselves. They are desperate for a sense of security, safety, and comfort, and that keeps them at the mercy of external conditions.
When you can learn to accept and appreciate the temporal nature of life, you begin to experience a joy and freedom most will never know. You grant yourself the ability to ride the waves of life with pleasure and ease. You don’t place an unrealistic expectation that specific conditions in and of themselves will make you happy.
Not Ever Feeling Too Stuck
In many cases, people can take on too much at once and find themselves in a position that is hard to untangle. You buy an expensive home, get set up with a marital partner, and start a family, all while trying to support it off of a fixed income that barely covers it. Expenses continue to grow and income stays the same. Next thing you know 15 years has passed and you ask yourself where the time has went. Your pockets haven’t gotten any bigger, your job hasn’t gotten any more exciting, and the only thing that’s changed is that your hair is now greyer and your blood pressure has gotten higher.
The joys of not buying into this way of living is always knowing that you are free to leave. I say this particularly for when you are young. At 48 things may be different. You may find yourself leaning toward the comfort and stability of having a more regular situation. But at a young age, when you have so much to learn and so much to experience, sometimes it’s better to have that flexibility.
If you are working a job, and it doesn’t feel like it’s what you would want to continue to do, you know that you can leave and be alright. You might be living in a small apartment that is nothing glamorous, but at least you know you don’t have to live there forever. You might be living in a small area that isn’t “all that” but at least you know that you could always relocate. If you got a call tomorrow about a job offer in a different state, you could accept that offer. If you decided you wanted to travel and take some time off, you can follow through and do that.
Enjoying Variety in Life
Some people are the types that find what they like, stick with it, and never change. They buy a home and live in it for years and years, pick up a job and stay at it for decades, and wear the same pair of shoes for 30 years.
When you embrace a more temporal path in life, you give yourself the ability to experience variety that keeps you engaged and keeps you growing as an individual. Your mind stays sharp and your body stays active. You don’t get too comfortable and complacent with continuing to sit in the same spot and do the same things.
For most people, life can very easily lose it’s sense of spice and flavor, mostly as a result of getting too set in stone and comfortable. Folks get into a groove, carve themselves out a lane there, and it becomes their coffin. They lose the adventurous nature of life. When you are old, maybe this isn’t such a bad thing, but when you are young, it’s just not what you want. You want to get out there and have some fun. And you want to explore, live, and experience. You don’t want to just continue to sit there and pick up dust.
Building New Connections
As a young person that enjoys hustling, building, and making moves, sometimes it’s in your favor to have a large network and continue to interact with new people. Afterall, one of the joys of business is that relationships can continue to grow over time even if they aren’t always romantically or intimately involved.
When you get overly tied up and tied down, you tend to interact with the same people day in, day out. You see the same people at work, the same people at home, and the same people in your community. This isn’t always a bad thing. Afterall, humans are conditioned to live amongst small groups of people. Many of our ancestors probably only interacted with 100 people throughout their lifetime.
However, one of the joys of being able to get out and build new connections is that you expand your horizons as an individual. You learn about different cultures. You build relationships that go on to be beneficial later on. In many cases, the best way to do this is to have the flexibility and freedom to meet new people. If you’re too beholden to a specific situation, person, or predicament, chances are you are going to miss out on this. It’s not for everybody. But to those who are ambitious and want to live to the fullest, it’s a big asset.
Thank You For Reading
As always, I want to thank you for taking the time to read this article. I hope that you have enjoyed, and I look forward to seeing you on the next one.
