My Leap of Faith

End December 2016 more than 16 years with the same company that has given me much of my professional experience came to a close. A company that has connected me with people who have become lifelong friends. A company that has always given me challenges that would stretch my capabilities, and at times bring me out of my comfort zone in a good way. A company that has enabled me to work across several continents, and gain more experience than I could ever hope for.

2 months into the new venture it is time to reflect on what discoveries have surfaced since this radical change in professional scope. This is not an exercise in evaluating my situation and pass judgement at the end if it makes sense or not. I encourage you to view the discoveries through of broader lens of what could come out of making a large change in your life.

Letting go of attachment

Knowingly and unknowingly we all develop a deep sense of attachment to many things. We do so to important things such as family and friends, which makes a lot of sense. Attachment are, however, also developed to less important things such as title, daily routines, silly preferences and so forth.

When taking a leap of faith, you are forced to let go of many of the attachments you have developed over the years being with the same organization. You will need to:

·     Establish a new routine of how to do about your day life

·     Maybe let go of material things if changes in financial situation has changed

·     Compromise in areas not needed before

·     Gain new learnings not earlier considered relevant

With these forced changes, you discover that life can be lived in many different way’s and all versions are great life experiences to gain.

Gaining fluidity that many different situations are worth experiencing will without doubt bring an increased sense of life quality and satisfaction.

Identity

How often have you meet somebody for the first time, and one of the first questions asked or being asked is “what do you do for a living?”

If not being careful it is very easy to form your identity around what you do. What you do is, however, not who you are!

Taking a leap of faith is an excellent opportunity to pause, reflect and paint a full picture of all the things that makes up who you are and what makes you unique. Answering 2 simple questions being “what do I want to be” and “what do I appreciate in my life” each morning is a wonderful way of practicing going beyond the typical labels we put on our self.

You don’t need the perfect plan

Do you formulate the perfect plan and then make a change? Or do you dare to make a change without the perfect plan?

My experience has been that hitting the reset button with a general sense was just the perfect thing to do. In many ways, how can you gain clarity of what really matters to you, while daily being at 100% capacity as is the case for many balancing career, family, friends and so forth.

Not having the perfect plan comes with several advantages:

·     Allows time to reflect and get a better sense of what is meaningful to you. You think and reflect better when some of the daily doings are lessened

·     Creates room for better dialog with others for inspiration. Always easier to listen actively when our own mind is not made up 100% about what to do

·     Allows room to experiment and test ideas before nailing down exactly what I should do going forward

How much of a plan depends on your specific situation. No reason to be reckless. On the other hand, my sense is that we often build stories of why a leap of faith can’t be taken in our situation, and why status quo is the way to go.

I’m forever thankful for everything the last 16 years have brought me. And also thankful for taking a leap of faith in order to write new and exciting chapters in my life.