The Path Less Travelled

When I was growing up and I was asked what I wanted to be when I grew up- I had boldly decided and said each time “I want to be a scientist, an artist and a rock climber”. I had it all figured out. Four months of each, on a year by year rotation. To most adults, this was absurd. 

“What makes you excited to get out of bed in the morning?” I asked the Big 4 partner as I sat in the fancy offices all dressed up in my new corporate outfit as an intern, 10 years ago. He was there to impress us. Or rather to impress upon us the corporate clone path that lay ahead. He tried to make it seem exciting. But he dodged the question, “I get to play cricket on the weekends and go overseas twice a year” he missed the point. 

To the question what in your day to day life (weekdays included) makes you excited to get out of bed. For that there was no answer. 

In the following years I came to learn. Those office hours, extensive hours were tough. I worked 15 hour days, weekdays and weekends, public holidays too all while completing my full time CA (Chartered Accounting Qualification) study, which left little time for even a game of cricket on the weekends or otherwise. 

I looked at those firm partners, and decided I wasn't going to turn out like them. But I didn't know what else was on offer. 

So I did the parallel conventional route and after a few years I left the firm, to go in-house, to hire the firm to outsource work to. I knew they were the best, with the best people, with a strong work ethic, albeit many lacking the joy of life, and produced high quality outputs.

In my role as Chief Audit Executive of a national digital Bank.

After navigating Covid, 4 CEO's, a divorce, developing a unique audit methodology and building the whole in-house audit division from scratch, I decided it was time to take a breath. I decided to quit, and walk into the unemployment abyss. 

I took a sabbatical. Before I was 30. It changed me. 

I don't think I've ever fully subscribed to following the crowd or the norm. When I was in uni I used to experiment with different back road routes to bypass the peak hour traffic. 

As a girl I was more into climbing rocks at the beach than playing with Barbie's. 

Touch rugby over netball, purple over pink and being one of 6 girls in a class of 200 doing mechatronic engineering. 

The engineering didn't last, but the male/female ratio did endure though, through boardrooms and executive teams. Often the only female, often the youngest, by a lot. But I was ok with that. I liked playing the different game, I was never one for conformity. 

During my sabbatical I realised there was so much more to life. I made an intentional decision to learn what I enjoyed, before the age of retirement, so I could build it into my everyday or at least my weekly routine, and get out of bed excited in the morning. I started spending most of my time with people doing handstands and running ultras and lifting weights, it opened my eyes to a new way of living. We went snorkeling in the middle of the day and camping in the middle of nowhere. Fun didn't cost money because we had time, and freedom of time. There were less fancy dinners, because eating under the stars hundreds of kilometers from civilization was more fun.

What I discovered in stepping away was that without a job title defining my identity, life could be redesigned, not just lived by default. With a job, the routines and security were already mapped out for me, but so were the limitations on time, on adventure - working 9-5 and 4 weeks annual leave a year, not much time for freedom. Without that structure, I suddenly had to ask myself “What do I actually want to wake up to each day? What fills me with energy, rather than drains it?” It was confronting to realise how seldom I’d ever asked those questions during my career. Why be a cog in the machine, when I could be a glitch in the matrix? Then all that was left was “the how”. How do I build my life into a long term adventure and build what I want along the way?

The scientist dream turned into being a Banking Executive reality developed into being a Money Coach, the rock climber morphed through weightlifting and snorkelling into ultra running and the artist, well that stuck and developed into a published, exhibited abstract Australian artist. 

And here I am with my days rather than my future retirement years allocated to my idealistic childhood goals. Managing my time between money coaching and painting and training. 

I wish people knew that there are other paths that could make them so much happier. And it's often relatively simple once you know what you need to do. 

I think it's time we look at other options, what actually makes us happy and build our finances for adventures and nights under the stars. We need to choose to redesign our lives for living.

Maybe we need to take the path less travelled.