Many of us go through life following the path that many generations before us have been following. Society criticizes anyone who tries to walk on their own path and break away from the life of conformity. Stepping out of the traditional path is challenging in many ways, but what is more rewarding than living the life you want to live?
It has taken me a very long time to get to a point where I feel comfortable stepping out of conformity. Maybe some of you can relate to this.
When I was a kid, my parents were pretty strict. I had a lot of rules and lived a pretty sheltered life. I lived with my parents as an only child in suburbia. Both of my parents worked a lot growing up and I was alone often. I watched them work their way from a studio apartment with a pull out bed to a 2400 sq ft home. I am actually extremely grateful for my upbringing, and that I had such a stable home growing up. After seeing them work this hard to have it all disappear withing a short time-span made me realize that anything can happen. I needed to start living the life I wanted to live.
At twelve years old, my parents moved me out of the town I grew up in to a few towns over that was significantly smaller.
I don’t know what it was about moving to a new town, but something in me changed and I started rebelling hard. It felt like my entire life up until this point I was told who to be. Moving to a new place allowed me to change that if I wanted to. Not long after we moved, I met a neighbor who was much older than me. Before you know it, I was smoking my dad’s cigarette butts out of the ash tray and sneaking off to smoke weed. By the age of fourteen I was snorting cocaine.
Since then, the way I live my life has always been unconventional.
I remember once running through backyards in the ghetto of Aurora, Il. We were being chased by dogs, climbing over fences, with gunshots going off in the background. It was around 4 a.m.; My friend at the time and I were on Ecstasy and probably an eight ball of coke each. We were running because we just took a Xanax and wanted to get back to her mom’s house before they kicked in and we passed out. I was 16 at the time.
When I was 22, a couple girlfriends and I stayed up all night drinking, per usual. Around 6 or 7 a.m. someone decided we should go on a road trip to Vegas. We all agreed, hopped in my Saturn Ion and hit the road. I woke up around 2 p.m. to my friend driving and the sound my windshield wipers. One of the blades was scratching the window because the rubber had come off of it.
In that moment, I was in complete disarray. I had no idea where I was or what we were doing.
She looked so tired as my hangover kicks in and I start questioning what we were doing. We were almost all the way through Iowa, and I am laughing hysterically at how stupid we were. None of us brought clothes, money, food or anything in preparation for a trip to Vegas. However, that wasn’t enough to stop us from continuing to try. We made it a few hundred miles into Nebraska when we were hit by a blizzard because none of us were smart enough to realize it’s fucking winter. Reality hit us really hard when we couldn’t even afford the cheap hotel we pulled over at. Now we’re stranded in rural Nebraska, in a blizzard with no means to take care of ourselves. In that moment, as we’re calling one of their moms for money, I realized how trapped I was.
The crazy shenanigans lasted for many, many years, and I’m happy that I lived to tell the tale.
There are a few times that I’m lucky I didn’t die. While these two examples aren’t the craziest experiences I’ve had, they’re just a couple memories I can laugh at now. It’s the times that I don’t like to talk about that scared me into wanting to live a “normal” life. Not to mention the birds in my ears telling me I’m living wrong. The constant noise whispering that I need to do this and that in order to be successful or happy.
Whether it was friends, family, the media or society in general, it was pretty much the same story and timeline I was supposed to follow.
I needed to get a 9-5 cubicle, with only 2 weeks of relief a year and holidays off – if you’re lucky. If you’re super lucky, they’ll let you pay a ridiculous amount for sub-par health insurance. I needed to become subservient for a man and society by quieting my mouth, while keeping my appearance covered in makeup and chemicals, and my body bare of hair. My body needed to be skinnier; A “friend” of mine even recommended I get a lap band. This way, a man might want to marry me one day. Then I can bare his children, stop living life for myself, and stop dreaming right then and there.
We’ll become slaves to a bank and the system for 30 years as we put everything we own and a couple kidneys down on a house. My husband starts to work extra hours every night to be able to pay for Timmy’s photography hobby, and Suzie’s ballet. You get the picture; The standard 1950’s “picket fence” dream isn’t the life I wanted to live. (If this is the life that you want to live, by all means, do you boo-boo. I am not trying to offend you, but it’s just that the thought of that life makes my skin crawl.)
For good reason, I was always criticized for the outlandish lifestyle I chose for myself in my teens and twenties. It was reckless, unhealthy and dangerous.
Plus, after years of depleting my natural supply and stopping the production of serotonin and dopamine with drugs and alcohol, I had become really depressed. The only way that depression would go away is if I got drunk/high again. Even then, sometimes the depression would be stronger than the alcohol and there would be an emotional purge.
At 26, I was living in my mom’s basement, drinking every single day to the point of blacking out. I was a bartender a few nights a week which allowed me to pay for my addictions because I had no other responsibilities besides my phone bill, insurance and gas for my car. The lack of responsibility allowed me to be able to afford to go to festivals and eat good from the available buffet of drugs.
After years of living this way, though, I was no longer having fun.
Something in me decided maybe I should try living a different way. I thought maybe if I lived a more conventional life that I would be happier, and it would cure my depression. At this point, I thought if I stayed where I was, I wasn’t going to live much longer. I was so unhappy with my current state mentally, physically and emotionally. I wasn’t happy with my past, my present or what I saw for my future.
That’s when I made drastic changes to my life; I got sober, moved across the country, got a 9-5 job and have been struggling to find myself since.
I thought that by doing these things, I was magically going to be happier. I’ve talked before about how sobriety has actually just ripped the band-aid off of some deep wounds. After a decade of improperly self-medicating, I made a small cut into an oozing, infected sore that I now have to work at much harder to heal. However, through the healing, my dreams have become even bigger.
Taking the time to be alone, and “find myself”, has really allowed me to see what it is that I really want. Or rather, what I don’t want.
I realized a conventional life wasn’t for me. Working a mundane job with no purpose, while having to be someone I’m not for the majority of my waking hours, wasn’t working for me. I felt even more depressed than I was before I got sober. I kept practicing things like daily positive affirmations, journaling, and telling myself that everything will someday work out.
Of course, that wasn’t without moments of absolute panic. In fact, anxiety is something else that has appeared with sobriety. Honestly, I didn’t deal with anxiety like this until after sobriety. I started going to therapy and having to deal with the stigma around that.
I realized, no matter what you do, whether it’s throwing your life away for addiction, or working 9-5 m-f with a 401k going to therapy… people are going to judge you.
Someone is always going to have something to say about the way you’re living. Since I’m not happy living the life I’ve been told is the way I’m supposed to live, I am going to change it. Even though my plans and dreams are big and unconventional, I’m not going to give them up because someone else says it’s not normal.
My philosophy is, if you’re not hurting anyone or disrupting someone else’s life by living yours, than do whatever the hell you want.
That’s where I think people have a hard time in their own lives. They so badly want to be accepted that they’re willing to live a life that’s considered “normal” to avoid the criticism of others, even if it’s killing them inside. I was that person. There’s an awesome quote from Jim Carey, “Depression is your avatar telling you its tired of being the character you’re trying to play.”
I was sick of trying to live a life that someone else wanted me to live.
Even though my current plans and goals have gotten somewhat of a backlash from those in my inner circle, I realized their opinion doesn’t matter. No matter who they are or how close we are. Just because they wouldn’t live that life doesn’t mean you shouldn’t. Your life is yours and yours alone. The number one thing people regret on their deathbed is not living their life for them, and giving up on their dreams. If the people that surround you are not cheering for you and are constantly a “debbie downer,” you’re surrounded by the wrong people.
It’s better to walk alone than to walk with people who hold you back from your dreams and personal growth and development.
It has taken almost three years of walking alone to feel comfortable knowing I don’t fit in with the general population of society. I like taking myself out to eat, and going on adventures alone. I have learned to enjoy my own company and I think as time goes on I will be more and more comfortable in this new skin. It’s becoming easier and easier to ignore the negative buzz that surrounds me.
I’m telling you all of this because I want you to know that you can do this too. It might be hard, lonely and depressing at times, but you come out of it stronger than ever. It gives you strength to actually go after those dreams everyone told you were unrealistic. No dream is too big and this life is too short. Even if you think you failed miserably, at least you tried to do something with your life instead of being a slave to societal norms. Besides, the only time you fail is if you give up or never try.
Living a life of conformity isn’t for everyone.
In fact, conforming to a society not meant for you can land you in a deep depression confused because you thought you were doing everything right. It’s okay to live outside the box. It’s okay to have big dreams that no one else believes in because that’s what makes life worth it. If it’s your dream to find love and settle down, popping out a few nuggets, by all means – Please do that! I’m not here to tell you how to live your life, which is why I would appreciate it if everyone could have that same respect.
On that note, if you’re interested in what unconventional life I’ve been up to, check out my YouTube Channel, MyBasicJourney. What I love about YouTube is that no matter what lifestyle you’re into, that platform has an entire community built around it.
Thank you so much for being here. Even if I’ve gotten negative responses to my lifestyle, the support and love from some of you has been absolutely wonderfully. I love finding new people that want to live a similar free-spirited and nomadic lifestyle, free from the structures of conformity. Please feel free to comment below or reach out to me with the contact page with any questions or comments. I love hearing from you all.
xoxo