Gap year diary – A surprise discovery & 5 foundations of Life 2.0

I am on a gap year in 2021 to explore how I want to spend my 40s and craft my life 2.0.

This update is about a surprising discovery I made in the last few months of the gap year and the story behind a frequently asked question in the gap year – the why and how of my journey to get ready for the gap year and life 2.0 transition.

In my gap year, something unexpected happened three months back.?I decided to pick a sport from scratch at this age and explore whether I could develop myself to become a competitive player over the next 5-10 years (long term goal to play in the tennis 40+ seniors tour). Please don't ask me WHY! I have no clue. I have never been athletic or played any sport competitively, even at the school level. Is it a desire to reclaim an unexplored part of childhood? An attempt to live multiple lives in one? I don't know the WHY, but I find the impulse intriguing. I am choosing to focus on the HOW – the nitty-gritty of pulling together the regimen to train like an athlete. The WHY will reveal itself when ready.

Nine months of gap year and the surprising twists it has taken, gifting me new lenses to better understand myself and the nature of things. It started with questioning the proper foundation of my gap year (presence versus productivity). It then led me to identify the three questions I want to answer for myself as a parent (my unique role as a parent? What it takes to look at the world through a kid's eyes? Can parenting serve as a pathway for self-renewal and growth?). And now this surprising quest to develop myself as a competitive tennis player.

The gap year is teaching me the power of surrender to the NOW. To let myself go along for a ride with the whispers of the heart. I am landing in more intriguing places than I would travel with my mind!

A frequent question during the gap year:?WHY and HOW did I get ready for the gap year and life 2.0 transition?

Let's start with the WHY. It began as an intellectual curiosity about what it takes to craft a healthy and happy hundred-year life. This curiosity was triggered by reading Peter Drucker (father of management), who discussed how the world around us had changed (longer life spans, breakdown of lifelong careers in one organisation, and shift from manual to knowledge work) and how this shift places unprecedented new demands on the individuals (to take charge of crafting their own career and life especially from 2nd half onwards where no templates exist). The life model of study-work-retire was outdated, yet there was no other game in town. A hundred-year life could feel overwhelming, or could it also be an opportunity to live multiple lives in one life if one can bring irrepressible imagination & curiosity to the task?

Over time, this intellectual curiosity became personal as I sought answers to craft my own life. I had just turned 30. I loved my job, but I often wondered about lives unexplored beyond my career. What if I was supposed to do something else with my life? Quitting my job made little sense since I liked what I was doing and had no specific alternative in mind.

What if I could start experimenting with my alternate selves without disrupting my current life?

I started moonlighting in whatever felt like my calling-at-the-moment in life. I would keep a diary to reflect on what I learnt by doing, and fingers crossed, one thing will lead to another over time to reveal what I am supposed to do with my life.

I wanted to be a professor. I experimented with teaching guest lectures and full-term courses on marketing and self-development. I felt the joy of seeing people grow and especially the value of sharing insights rooted in experience. But I also realised that I liked teaching part-time only, not as a full-time job. The joy of teaching came from synthesising at 30,000 feet the lessons I was learning daily on the ground in corporate life. One would not work without the other.

I thought I wanted to be a writer. I started publishing newspaper articles on personal growth and people development. It further reinforced what I was beginning to realise during teaching – I only enjoy writing or teaching when I have something authentic to share borne out of personal real-life experiences. Else, these passions become just another job.

Then, there was this vague itch for many years to get involved in public policy formulation in a passion area like education. I started a distance education diploma from LSE to at least understand what it is all about. While reading course material one night, I was amazed to discover the number of players involved in public policy formulation and execution. I recall a chart on education that talked about government, for-profits, non-profits, think tanks, foundations, national and international inter-governmental entities, etc. A million ways to get involved in making a difference in any area!

I was intrigued. What if I could better understand what each of these players does & whether I should switch to any of them?

I started researching, but desk research felt incomplete. What if I took a few months sabbatical for a proper deep dive? I might not like what I find, but better to confront my dreams than to live with the what-ifs.

I decided to take a three-month sabbatical. I considered interning in a think tank, volunteering in a non-profit, pro bono consulting with a social enterprise etc. Each felt exciting but also limited in helping me see the entire landscape of opportunities.

At some point in planning, I realised that I was trying to solve the wrong problem. My focus was on information accumulation. That external quest for information masked the inner search I needed to undertake – the quest to understand my inner WHY and what fears might be holding me back. The pursuit had to become personal, not just intellectual.

I decided to use my sabbatical to explore this life transition through the eyes of people who had already made the shift.

In a whirlwind journey over three months in 2011, I crisscrossed 20 plus cities across India, the USA and Europe, meeting 100+ people for in-person interviews (pre covid days!).

I met heads of foundations, think tanks, politicians, academicians, social entrepreneurs, writers, non-profit founders etc. – the common thread being that they all had started their working life in the corporate world before choosing differently. Some made the transition early (20s/ early 30s), some in mid-career (late 30s/40s), and some late in their career or as 2nd/3rd inning (50s onwards).

I had the same five questions for all of them – what they were seeking and why, any specific trigger for final transition, expectations before transition, reality after the transition, and what they learned.

In these heartfelt 1x1 conversations, I began to realise the nuances of personal trade-offs, which I did not see covered in the media coverage of these people in my pre-interview research. The world likes its stories neat. We like supremely self-assured heroes and heroines who can be put on a pedestal to admire, free of any self-doubt, failures, or misgivings about their path.

I heard differently. While people were proud of following their heart, they were also forthright about the trade-offs. Some spoke of lifestyle compromises linked to financials. Marriages that broke up as one person's vision grew out of sync with other person's understanding of the marriage contract and the kind of life they had signed up for. Health and stress impact of life 2.0 choices wherein they were working harder than ever before. A lingering doubt at times whether it was the right choice to have left behind their flourishing career. Some still had to face parents perplexed at this itch in what seemed earlier a perfect life.

The more I listened, the more I started to understand the complexity of life transitions - far more nuanced, multi-layered and unique to each individual. The black and white framework of life transition choices (you either have the guts to switch or not) seemed inadequate.

Over time, I distilled my learnings into five foundations to be true for what I call Life 2.0 transition (a life where you run your own race at your own pace),

1. Money - Financial flexibility of passive income for the desired lifestyle,
2. Relationships – In your primary relationships, whether parents or spouse, have you mutually understood the impact of your choices on their life? They might not agree with or share your vision, but can they at least appreciate your itch?
3. Health – Physical, mental, and spiritual (as you jump into the unfamiliar terrain of life 2.0, will you be held back by health issues you unwittingly created by neglecting your health in life 1.0?),
4. Career - Defining the success you want to achieve in your current career trajectory before quitting so that you don't long wistfully later over what could have been,
5. Identity - Creating space in life to experiment with your potential selves – Who will I be if not my current work identity built painstakingly over 10-20+ years? It's not about necessarily choosing an alternate identity. It is about creating the awareness that I am more than my work identity.

My sabbatical was almost over. I felt like a different person from the one that went in.

1. I realised that it would be premature to walk away from my corporate career. I was still fascinated by what lay ahead of me in terms of learning and experiences. If I walk away now, what-ifs might come back to haunt me.
2. I felt inadequately prepared for the multi-layered complexity of life transitions, including the five foundations of life 2.0. Could I dig into these areas consciously to get ready?
3. I felt grateful yet aware of the seduction of my current life. If I wanted to live multiple lives in one life, I had to set a clear deadline for myself. Else, life is too comfortable, and I might wake up one day to regret the lives that could have been. The risk of a life lived as a dress rehearsal. I set the deadline at 40, give or take 1-2 years.

I spent the last decade on a quest to put these five foundations in place - across money, relationships, health, career, and identity. In each area, I had to work out what success meant for me, where I stood initially, and how to tinker my way over the years through ups and downs to get to a place where I felt comfortable.

The following article will share what I learned about money, that necessary yet insufficient foundation for life transitions.

I love hearing from you. Do share your comments if anything resonates, your take on essential foundations to live life fully on own terms or just to say hello as a friend:)

Cheers,

Sameer Srivastav

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