By P. Coletta in Your Stories

I’m a “recovering” lawyer but like Marines, alcoholics, and Catholics, there’s some stuff you just can’t ever shake. About four years ago, I quit being a lawyer, and I’ve never looked back. I’ve quit other jobs and professions too and I’d like to tell you about it so that you can dig up that high school dream you had of owning a bakery or being a river guide and make it happen. My dream was always to live in a cabin in the Colorado mountains and ride horses. Guess what? I did just that.

Are you tired of being “squeezed?”

It took me 16 years to leave the law though I knew after about six months in law school that I was doomed. I wanted to give the gig a fair shot, so I worked for three different firms, thinking that a change of scenery would quell the restlessness inside me. But I came to find out that law firms are generic. They are like a tube of toothpaste: you have to squeeze the bottom to ensure abundance at the top. This, in fact, is the paradigm of American business in general. Are you tired of being squeezed yet? Or maybe you’re the top of the tube, gooping “abundance” all over the place and you still ache inside.

Life is weird folks, and it’s not a dress rehearsal.

This is it. This is your one shot. You want to spend ten hours a day in a job that makes your chest hurt? Not me. I’m a weenie, I guess. I’m not into suffering, and I’m pretty much a bum. I’m a solid citizen, I pay my taxes, I take care of my kids. But at heart, I’m a bum. Maybe you are too.

If I’m right, then the first thing you need to do to quit your job is change your mind, the way I did. If you really desire to simplify and change your life, you can do it. Don’t let anyone or any negative thought stop you.

I know, I know. The kids, the money.

Here’s how I handled it: for one thing, I never bought a new car; always (or mostly) a Honda, used, which I would drive until it stopped dead in the six-figure mileage area. Material stuff doesn’t interest me too much at all. I like to ski and would save up every year to take the kids to the mountains for five days. That was my extravagance. I invested wisely in real estate that was bound to appreciate. I didn’t mind moving every couple of years if the market was going to give an enormous return on my investment. My kids weren’t crazy about it but sometimes you don’t need to listen to them.

Toughen up!

After the kids and the money comes the saga about how the family has gotten used to a certain lifestyle, whatever it is. How about this as a response: too bad. Toughen up, buttercup. Mommy or Daddy or both of us are tired of being a workhorse. Truly, if folks love each other (as families profess they do), then they will do anything to support the happiness of the members of the clan. If, however, you’re easily intimidated by people having hissy fits about “stuff” they “need”…. I can’t really help you.

Rethink the way you manage your life.

So, if the first thing you need to do to quit your job is change your mind, totally rethinking the way you manage your life and your money, the next thing you need to do is dream. Remember dreaming? Do you even remember how to have a dream? Probably you are so absorbed in the daily grind of “making it” that you have forgotten what you are born to do.

I was born to be a cowgirl.

By circumstances of birth, however, I was a Philly girl, then a Jersey girl, a lawyer and a teacher before I finally donned my chaps. But I never let the dream die. I talked about it and fantasized about it and made my plan. And when my youngest son graduated high school I sold everything, packed my Honda CRV with clothes, books, and camping equipment, and went West. Now after a few years of using an outhouse I got a little tired of life on the ranch.  Cowboy Bob and I moved to Steamboat Springs where we live and play in the mountains, but with indoor plumbing.

Amazing things happen when you start to really “follow your bliss…”

…as Joseph Campbell would say. Once you leave the trappings of the life you’ve constructed, which is someone else’s idea of who you are, and you follow that creative impulse that’s been deep inside since you were a kid, benevolent forces will come out of nowhere to make it happen. Trust me on this one. The hardest part of this whole process is learning to be true to yourself, to pay no mind to the critical and harsh voices of those who would like you to stay the same … which might mean, to stay miserable.

Change your mind. Start dreaming again.

Don’t be afraid. Make a plan that begins with your decision to be happy. Then when the time comes to say good-bye to the job you never liked, or the place you never wanted to be, or the lifestyle you never wanted to live, you’ll do it with joy and not anger. Good luck … and happy trails.

Pcolletta submitted this article to the Your Stories section