What Do You Want to Do?

When I ask Steve what he wants to barbeque, he says, "Everything."  When people ask what are we going to do now that we've given up serious work, it's the same response, "Everything."  I want to do everything!  There are so many things to do and our list is so long, I wonder how we'll cram it all in, even if we had 50 years or more!

 

I didn't always feel that way.  For many years, I was well stuck on the 'consumption treadmill' and didn't even think of getting off.  Earn more money, get bigger stuff, earn more money, get bigger stuff...  And I enjoyed what I did, but I never looked at the alternatives and I never thought about what I would do when I reached a point were I got off the treadmill (retirement) or was pushed off the treadmill (loss of job, health, economic crisis).  I never even really considered not being on that treadmill until one day when Steve said, "I don't really want to work anymore, I'd like to 'retire' in 5 years."

 

I tried to think about what he said and drew an utter blank...but what would I DO?  All of my goals, targets and achievements had been centred around two things, (the most important) raising my daughter and making more money.  I defined myself and my success through work.  It's what I thought about, what we talked about (we ran a company together so that was dinner table conversation), and what I did for 10-14 hours a day, every day.  And I liked it!  We lived in London, had the high flying, work hard, play hard lifestyle.  It was exciting and all consuming.  We were having a great time and now we were going to do...what?

 

But it was also making us old, that lifestyle takes a big toll.  Living in separate countries during the week, eating at restaurants for three meals a day (not too terrible, but you constantly console yourself with food and get fat) and having our only moments of closeness over the mobile phone was taking a big toll.  Steve had the sense to see that there were alternatives, I hadn't even considered them.  Stepping off the treadmill...uh okay, but what would we DO? 

 

At first my list of what we would do was empty, a complete blank.  My view of retirement was what you did when you got too old to work and you then spent your time on the golf course and playing bridge (no offense to the golfers / bridge players in the audience, but oooohhhh nnnooooo!!) - really boring until you died (probably of the boredom!).  I had no idea what we would do (visions of rocking chairs dancing in my head!). 

 

Then a few things crept onto the list.  I've always wanted to learn to dance (ballroom, latin) really well, but never had the time for it, that could go on the list.  I looked longingly at my photo albums and stacks of pictures, stories just waiting to be written - that could go on the list.  We wanted to learn to sail and then go sailing.  The list of places to visit began to grow and ways in which we wanted to see them grew too (via motorbike, sailboat, RV, tandem bicycle).  The list of things to do grew longer too - learn Italian, walking tours in England and in Europe, learn to play music, go back to drawing, painting, writing.  All of sudden (actually it was more like two years), the trickle of ideas became a flood!  The list was full, overflowing and now it's at the point where I don't know how on earth we'll ever fit it all in!

 

The idea of not working moved from being a blank and scary unknown to intensely interesting, fascinating and something that will consume our attention for years.  We've defined what 'everything' is for us and we want to do it all - even if we have to start project managing to fit it all in!

 

The bad news is time flies. The good news is you're the pilot.  Michael Althsuler

 

What are the things on your list?  If you got off the treadmill (for whatever reason), would you encounter a blank, empty place or would you be thrilled because you finally have the chance to do EVERYTHING on your list?

Up Hills and Everything!

Yesterday was a gorgeous, sunny, warm and not rainy day so we took the
tandem out for a tour around the Ribble Valley. We're starting our
'training' for our bike trip to France in September. Steve has just
informed me that one day we will be pedalling 53 miles! Now on a tandem
bike, there is no 'get out clause'. I cannot get tired and call a taxi,
it's just too big to fit so I have to be able to do the mileage!

We headed off from our house and stopped to pick up a few things at the shop
for lunch. This is what we'll be doing on the trip so we wanted to test it
out. We now know that we need a Swiss Army knife or somesuch for cheese and
opening things and that we cannot forget napkins. Also we need a lunch
container that doesn't get mooshed when strapped to the bike with bungie
cords.

Immediately after the shop, we headed uphill. Unlike biking in Florida
which is all flat for miles, the Northwest of England is loaded with hills.
As a matter of fact, if you're not going down a hill, then you're going up
one! And hills have never been my thing. On the tandem, hills are better -
and that's not because Steve does all the pedalling! It's not so easy to
'opt out' mid way up, but there's the sense of being in it together - plus
Steve understands what gears to use to make it easier. It's very funny,
there's one gear that's so low, people walking pass us!

We did 17 miles. Now for the bicyclists in the audience, that's baby stuff,
but for me it was amazing! I've never done more than 3 or 4 miles and I
didn't like that much (actually my idea of exercise has always been turning
the pages of a book!). It was beautiful riding along the country lanes,
past the hedge rows and coming up over the top of a hill and seeing the
patchwork quilt of the valley before us.

After yesterday, I think I can do this except for one thing - 'bicycle
backside'. I thought with the padding I have on my backside plus padded
shorts, spending time on the seat of a bike wouldn't be a problem - not so!
Those 'backside bones' immediately found a direct connection with the bike
seat and proceeded to grind, bounce and bruise over every inch of those 17
miles. My legs were fine and wanted to continue. My lungs were fine and
ready to go. Not so the backside! Steve says it's one of those things that
you just have to keep going and after 6 weeks (WEEKS!!!) or so it will be
fine. Oh goodie...

Other than that and the silly hats, it's great fun!

Challenge Yourself Physically

About three years ago, I started having difficulty with my back particularly with getting out of bed in the morning and my knees were giving me trouble especially when going up and down stairs.  I also noticed that my flexibility was not that great.  Trouble getting out of bed in the morning, aching knees, flexibility issues - sounds like a 70-year-old, right?  At the time, I thought, 'Hey, wait a minute, I'm only 43!'  I could see those things happening to someone in their 70's or 80's, but not to someone in their 40's.  This was after years of a high intensity work style and it only got worse over the next three years as I added the 'road warrior' aspect of living out of a suitcase in hotels lifestyle.

 

Now if those are the things occurring in my mid 40's, what is going to be happening physically when I hit 60 or 70 or 80?  There's an awfully long time between the ages of 40 and 60/70/80 to be experiencing those aches and pains, especially because aches and pains usually only become worse as you get older.  If I'm having trouble getting myself out of bed in my 40's, what am I going to be like 20 years from now?!  That could look like 20, 30 or 40 YEARS of aching back, knee pain and limited flexibility?  Uh-huh, not if I can help it!

 

It seems like we (and this is the collective we now, not the Steve and I we) forget (ignore?) that our bodies lose resiliency as we get older and that we may not snap back so quickly from the damages we inflict upon ourselves.  We go through our lives heaping on bad eating, poor nutrition, virtually no exercise, stress and diminishing levels of sleep.  We end up overweight with no strength or flexibility, crabby from tension, and unable to do anything but sit in front of telly because we're too tired, sore, stressed to do anything else.  We pile this on year after year and then we hit retirement we're surprised because instead of visiting the wonders of the world, we spend all our time trying to find the wonders of the medical world - to repair / cure what is almost certainly now unrepairable / incurable. 

 

What took a few days to repair in one's 20's, takes a few weeks to repair in one's 30's and months to repair in one's 40's.  If we are going to enjoy, maximise, have a fantastic time in the 2nd half of our 750,000 Hours, we need to be physically fit for it - and I think that's something we tend to ignore in our day-to-day living.  We assume we're just going to magically get to the day when we give up serious work and, poof, all of a sudden we'll be able to sail across oceans, climb mountains and bike ride across America / Europe.  Actually, if we don't pay attention and make sure our bodies are ready, we'll get to do the exact opposite of those things as we struggle with a walker, a powered cart and our shopping bag full of meds between home and the doctor's, home and the hospital.

 

Bend down and place your hands flat on the floor, can you do it?  Can you ride 20 or 30 miles on a bike?  Can you walk (without having to call a 'rescue taxi') 6 or 7 miles?  Is your body ready to give you the post-work life you're planning on?   If it's not, now's the time to start doing something about it - not when you hit 65.

 

Some find they can get / keep in shape by going to the gym.  Others keep physically active, strong and flexible through running, yoga, dance.  They make time on a regular basis to work on themselves physically.  We're doing it by challenging ourselves physically in a 'change your whole lifestyle' way.  We spent the winter clambering around and pulling ropes on a sailboat, we lost weight and gained a ton of flexibility (amazing how flexible and strong you get when the step from the dingy to the boat is 3 feet high and you're pulling sails against a 20 mile per hour wind).  We also didn't have a car in any of the places we went to so we walked everywhere and carried everything in our arms.  This summer, we're continuing to build strength and recovering our aerobic capability on a tandem bicycle.  We'll get up to 45 miles per day for a minimum of three days in a row in preparation for a two-week bike trip through Brittany.  The goal, to physically challenge ourselves and to get into optimum shape now - then to maintain that shape so that we're physically capable to do the things we want to do as we get older.  One of our Red Book (see earlier posts on this topic) goals for this year is to get in the best shape of our lives.

 

When was the last time you physically challenged yourself and is your body ready to do all the things you're wanting to do during the second half of your 750,000 Hours?

 

 

 

 

At Sea Over Saving Money?

One of the best ways to enjoy your 750,000 Hours is to save enough money so you don't have to work (or work so much) and you can go out and do the things you want to do - rather than run around doing the things other people want you to do.  But saving big hunks of cash can be really difficult, at times it may seem almost impossible.  We learned many of our savings / thrifty habits from sailors.  Actually, not sailors, sailboat liveaboards.  These are people who have cast off the lines tying them to jobs and mortgages and sail about the world on their sailboats.  They are sailors, but they have a very different mindset and approach than those who sail for a few weekends or weeks a year.  Often their resources are quite finite and they have to be very careful about what they spend because, with no job, once they run out of money, they're REALLY out of money.

 

Toast, of Toast Floats, is one of those folks and has written a really interesting post about how not to spend money while sailing.  Her one piece of advice, "Do not go to town."  When sailing, you can anchor your boat in a lovely deserted harbor and, guess what?  You could stay for weeks and not spend a dime.  As soon as you hit land and towns, the spending begins.  No town, no spend!

 

We found the exact same thing while sailing, but this approach also applies to land-based living.  Steve and I are currently in England for the summer, at home in the Northwest.  We can go for days, weeks even, not spending a pence.  As soon as we hit town, the money just comes pouring out of the wallet.  'We need this, gotta have some of that, and oh some of those too!'  It's a virtual wallet haemorrhage.  So we don't go to town.

 

How often do you 'go to town'?  Do you find it really hard not to spend money when wandering through the mall, the DIY store, the grocery store?  It's nearly impossible!  Try not going to town or going to town much less often and see how much less you spend!

 

Actually we do have to go to town (not very often though!) to apply another sailing savings approach, provisioning.  Provisioning on a sailboat is to stock it up with all the food you're going to need for the next 3-6 months or so and then sail off to where there are no (or very few) grocery stores.  Provision once and then DON'T go back into the store.  Grocery stores are big time spending temptations, loaded with all that great stuff to try and buy.  Tough to escape one of those without dropping a big chunk of change.  Have you ever nipped into a grocery store for 'just a few things' and walked out a hundred dollars later wondering what the heck you spent it on?  This winter, we provisioned for three months and spent $500.  We then spent approximately $100 over the next three months buying fresh stuff when we could find a store, when the mailboat had delivered, when the fruit and veg on the shelf wasn't all shriveled because the mailboat was overdue.  We provisioned once and then used what we had.  Rather than running to the grocery store when we didn't have something, we had to make due - there was no grocery store so we didn't spend.  And when we left the boat, there was still a lot of stuff left in the cupboards for us to use next year!

 

Now at sea, we do all kinds of things to make fruit and veg last longer (green bags in the fridge, buying things that last a really long time and canned goods).  On land, we'll do a big provision at the grocery store, stock up on everything and then periodically restock fresh fruit and veg from the farmers' market.  The temptations are far less at the farmers' market - what are you going to do, get more broccoli, go on a squash spending spree, get extravagant with eggs?! 

 

We've just 'provisioned the house', spending £346 on groceries for the summer.  We will need to supplement this with fresh (dairy, fruit and veg) and correct any quantities we didn't get right over the course of the summer and that will run somewhere in the £150 range.  That is our food cost for the next three months and if you've read some of the earlier posts you know we are foodies who like eating delicious food all the time, this isn't a diet of beans and toast! 

 

You might enjoy this look at weekly food expenditure in different kitchens around the world.  Try staying out of town and provisioning once every three months and see how much you save!

The 'Greater Than Yourself' Project

Read a really interesting article by Steve Farber on Harvard Business Publishing on the Greater Than Yourself Project (GTY), which speaks primarily about mentoring in the business and leadership sense which is the traditional way we look at mentoring.  Mentoring as in the identification of someone in your business environment who you can give a 'leg up' to by sharing your business expertise.  According to Farber:

 

"Most business leaders have learned that our job is to expand and develop our own capacity, while simultaneously preparing the next generation of leaders to take the reins. Develop talent, we've been taught. Be helpful. Be a coach. Mentor someone. But it doesn't happen all that often — at least, not in any significant way.

I believe it's time for us to set a new gold standard for what it means to be a leader of substance and influence." 

I think it's time to set a new gold standard when it comes to mentoring for life.  You see a lot less about mentoring as it relates to life.  Parents mentor in some senses (nag, cajole, harp, plead!).  Periodically we'll meet someone who we get some good ideas from, but how often do you run into a 'life mentor'?  They're really few and far between.

 

The GTY endeavor doesn't have to be done with someone from work.  How about sharing some of your hard earned knowledge with someone in your personal life?  Have you shared what you know about money and investing with your children or other young people you're close to?  Have you shared your secrets on how to get a discount, a good flight, an upgrade, a great buy on a vacation, how to buy a great house, how to save money on taxes, how to eat well, how to get along, how to make chocolate, how to be beautiful with those you love?  How to retire early and sail off into the sunset?  Often in the hustle and bustle of day-to-day living, those secrets, great tips and good learnings don't get shared because we're too busy - but who better to share them with than the ones we love?

 

That's the reason we write this blog, to share what we've learned along the way.  You've probably learned some pretty valuable things during your life journey, who could you share them with?

Fantastic Expertise at Your Fingertips

There are a couple of resources at our fingertips which I see consistently under-utilised which help to solve problems or help people really get ahead with what they want to do in life.  What do you do when confronted with a problem?  Do you struggle with it for months frantically trying to come up with a solution?  Do you talk with a few friends like yourself who are in similar situations who are also struggling to solve the same problem?  When you're trying to get ahead, do you take advantage of shortcuts which help you to rapidly make huge progress (without making a lot of mistakes)?

 

The answers to most of our questions, solutions to the majority of our problems and the guidance to help us get way ahead with our lives are all there for us.  Do you ever think "Oh, if I only knew how to..."?  The answer to that question is there too.  Wouldn't it be nice to have your own personal team of experts advising you every step of the way, mentors who are experienced in exactly what you're trying to do who have all (or many) of the answers?  'Wow, the answers to my questions, someone telling me how to solve these tough problems, secrets and shortcuts on how to do what I want in life!'

 

'Yeah, right.  That stuff is only available to the very rich or the very lucky, not me.  There's nobody sitting out there waiting to solve MY problems, to help ME get ahead.  What a load of tosh!'

 

Actually, those answers and experts ARE right there for us, all day, every day.  We simply haven't been taught or it may not be our natural inclination to tap into them.  For some reason, we seem to think we have to figure out everything for ourselves.  If we don't figure it out for ourselves, somehow it seems like cheating.  Well, guess what?  We're not in high school anymore (thank God!) and it's okay to look at the answers during the test!

 

Where can you find all these experts and answers?  My two personal favourites, books and Google.

 

Now you're saying that sounds really simple and obvious.  Duh, right?  Back to my original question, what do you do when confronted with a question you don't know the answer to, a problem you don't know how to solve, or are seeking ways to get what you want out of life?

 

The first thing I do is make a trip to Borders or spend some time on Google.com.  I tap into the knowledge of mankind (sounds pretty impressive, doesn't it?!) and search for my answers there first BEFORE I attempt to recreate the wheel by attempting to solve a problem which has already been solved.  Why should I waste my time doing something someone else has already done for me?  And by the way, most of the problems we attempt to solve have already been solved by someone else - so why invest our energy and our precious 750,000 Hours trying to solve them again?!

 

Throughout my life, I didn't have people standing beside me doling out answers as and when I needed them.  Mentors were few and far between.  Then one day I was wandering around Borders and I found a book on exactly how to deal with what I was facing, and then another, and another!  'Whoopie, bonanza, what a gift!  Now I don't have to spend any more time worrying, fretting, banging my head against the wall trying to figure this out - it's all right here!'  That day I learned to make my own mentors by seeking out the expertise available to me in books. 

 

When I needed technical skills to increase my salary, the computing section helped me build those skills.  When I wanted to get into management and later on consulting, there were plenty of management gurus with great advice for me.  When I wanted to become debt free, people who had done that themselves showed me the way.  When I wanted to create an income so I could retire at 46, the money and finance experts told me how to do it.  And I took lots of advice from those who have sailed the world, they helped make my first forays out onto the ocean safer and more exciting. 

 

The answers were all carefully written down for me.  All I had to do was read the book and do what a very seasoned, experienced expert told me to do.  'Hmmm, that sounds too easy...'

 

There's a bit more to it than read a book and do what the author tells you to do, but not much.  Finding the right book, the right author is also important.  You can't just pick up any old book, do what it says, and you'll be successful.  I use books written by 'true' experts.  I look for books written by those who have done it, not those who write about doing it or those who make a living telling people how to do it, but actually haven't done it themselves.  There are many theorists, academics, and pseudo experts out there.  I have nothing against any of those three, but in selecting MY experts I want people who have actually been in the trenches, not those who have observed with binoculars - one has participated in the experience, the other has simply observed it - I want the first.  Who has actually made the money from investing rather than from selling seminars on investing?  Who has actually been in debt and then become financially free?  Who has started their own business, quit their job, retired early?  Who has restored a house in Italy or lived on a sailboat?  Who has DONE what you want to do?  That's your expert!

 

You can also do the same thing with Google (be equally sure about expertise here!).  Type in your question or the problem you're trying to solve.  Don't be afraid to use descriptive words.  Rather than typing 'debt', type in 'how to eliminate debt and retire in 5 years'.  The first search will deliver a load of rubbish and the second will lead you to a great deal of information which can give you ideas on how to solve that problem.  (Most people get frustrated using search engines like Google because they type in very generic topics like 'debt' and get back millions of results containing the word debt, very few relating to their problem.  Use lots of words, ask your question, you can always take some out!)

 

You also need to actually follow the advice of your expert - this means you must actually do something.  The expert can lay it all out for you, detailed and step-by-step, but he cannot make you get up off your backside and do it.  I have found many times that some human beings even when handed the solution to their problem on a silver platter prefer to continue to wallow around in fear, anxiety, and frustration.  For some reason, they cannot seem to take that first step even when they have the answer right in front of them.   They are not typically people engaged in making the most of their 750,000 Hours though.

 

Take a stroll through Borders with your question, problem or challenge in your mind.  Pick up every book you see relating to that topic.  Go to the cafe and get yourself a coffee.  Flip through your stack of books until you've found your answer or found a book which walks you through getting to the answer.  There's your expert, there's how to solve your problem.  Now all you have to do is go and do it!

Achieving Our Mark

"The greater danger for most of us lies not in setting our aim too high and falling short; but in setting our aim too low, and achieving our mark."
– Michelangelo Buonarroti

What are you aiming for? Are you aiming high, aiming low, or not really aiming at all?

One of the things we don't often get trained in when growing up is how to set goals. We are, however, often told what our goals are - the big job, the big car, the big house, etc. - but as far as setting our own goals? Not so much.

What are your goals? Do they make you shiver with excitement when you look at them or are they so boring you forget about them as soon as you've written them down?

A few things I've learned about goals along the way:

- Make them big. As a matter of fact, make them so big you're not quite sure how you'll achieve them

- Make them fun. Even the really boring goals, make them fun too

- Make them life changing. Instead of more of the same-old, same-old, try some fantastically-new

There is huge power in setting big goals, amazing things happen. And without setting goals, I think we as human beings tend to amble around bumping into things. And then when we're 90, we wonder why we never really did anything with our lives. Perhaps we just got what we aimed for...

"Careful what you aim for, you just might get it - and if you aim for nothing, you just might get that too."

- Katherine Lachance

A Changing View

And the thing that will change our view this summer! The tandem has arrived!



Actually it arrived at 7:25 in the morning (what delivery company delivers at 7:25?!) and woke us out of a very deep, jet-lagged sleep - but we didn't mind because we've been excited about this one for a while! Steve immediately got up and started putting it together. It was all done in a couple of hours and ready to go.







Now we're just waiting for the rain to stop!

Another New View

One of the first things Steve did when we got home was check out the fit of his motorbike leathers! I gave him these as a wedding present 6 years ago and they fit him perfectly then. Over the years, they had gotten a bit snug. Now look at them, they're baggy!

Shopping is Not Therapy

Retail therapy was first used as a term in the 1980s with the first reference being this sentence in the Chicago Tribune of Christmas Eve 1986. "We've become a nation measuring out our lives in shopping bags and nursing our psychic ills through retail therapy."  Wikipedia

 

Shopping is not therapy, neither is it entertainment - at least for those who have fed into this particular con, those who do the shopping.  Rather than being therapy or entertainment for us, it really is excitement and a thrill for those who receive our money.  For us, it's a temporary pleasure, an attempt to fill a void created by a lack of work / life balance or a life that is out of balance. 

 

The dictionary definition of therapy:

1. Treatment of illness or disability.

2. Psychotherapy.

3. Healing power or quality.

 

Therapy is something that treats or heals.  If you put retail before therapy, as in 'retail therapy', it becomes all about retail and not really about therapy.  Spending time to buy things you don't need, with money you don't have - locking you into extra hours in a job you don't love and away from the people you do, does that sound like therapy?  As a matter of fact, it sounds more like the exact opposite, the evil therapist taking advantage of an unstable patient under his care. 

 

Retail therapy is a quick hit of pleasure, followed by pain.  It's that second bottle of wine, great that night, hell in the morning.  It's that extra hour lying in the sun on your first day of vacation, and that painful, red body the next. 

 

It's also your time, not only in the time used for shopping, but the time one must 'spend' to earn the money for shopping.  Do you want to be earning money for shopping or living?

 

In the retailer / shopper relationship, the only one getting therapy is the retailer, that great theraputic pleasure of counting the money that we continuously spend...

Staying in Touch - Even When You're Way Out There

There are a variety of tips and techniques for communicating for business or pleasure for those who wish to travel as they make the most of their 750,000 Hours. We're happy to pass along the ones that have worked and worked well for us. These are 'income generators', tools which enable people on the move to generate an income wherever they may be. These 'tools of the trade' enable true 'vituality', the ability to communicate from almost anywhere.

This technique enables you to access a wifi signal from a long distance. Now I can't tell you exactly how long a distance because, like the answer to many questions, that depends. It depends on your line of sight, the weather, and the strength of the signal you are trying to access. I will say that this approach enables us to regularly access wifi signals from our boat while it is anchored offshore in an anchorage - far more than a few hundred feet and often the distance is measured in miles (this does depend upon the strength of the shoreside sending unit).

You'll need your computer, a usb wireless adapter which expands the range you can access with your computer, an antenna which expands the range of the adapter even further, and a cable to link the adapter to the antenna. This picture shows both the adapter and the antenna that we use.

The adapter we use is the Engenius EUB 362 wireless USB adapter (there are other types of these adapters too). The cable is 30 feet of custom made LR400. Both of these are connected to an 8db outdoor omni directional antenna. The cable is long because we find we get a better / stronger signal if we run the antenna up the mast. Some folks have their antenna permanently attached to their boats / RVs, we do not - simply because we haven't found a high enough place to attach it where it wouldn't get wiped out by some piece of boat equipment. (And to give proper credit where credit is due, we learned about this from Tom on the sailboat Dream Catcher, www.tendervittles.net).

Just the Engenius by itself expands the range for your laptop considerable and it is small enough to be easily carried. If you have a vehicle to attach it to, the antenna expands the range even further.

While there are often wifi hotspots in many areas around the world, getting to them whilst shlepping one's laptop may not be really convenient. It's nice to be able to access a signal from the comfort of one's abode, wherever that may be!

Civilisation - Pah!

Started the first leg of our trip back to Europe Friday with a flight from Fort Lauderdale to Boston - or what we thought was going to be a flight to Boston...

Now both Steve and I have traveled for work and pleasure a great deal. We know that traveling has its challenges and that when travelling (particularly by plane), it makes sense to enter 'travel mode' as soon as you walk in the door of the airport. This is a zen-like state where you let the minor (and major) irritations of travel just wash right off you. You're prepared with books, laptops, food and drink so delays and other 'snafus' aren't such a problem because you have other things to do.

We have also been really lucky with travel. Even when flying several times a week over the course of years, the most difficult situation was sitting on the runway at Heathrow for about 90 minutes. Friday's US Airways experience made that seem like a mere niggle in comparison.

Problem with the plane, a broken air conditioning something or other so we got off the plane as soon as we loaded, but no problem the air conditioning in the airport was working just fine. As the hours passed, more and more passengers were rerouted to different destinations. We waited patiently. Our flight was at 11:30, at 4:00 we reboarded - yippee (or so we thought). We took off to Charlotte and after a quick load of more passengers we were supposed to take off again for Boston.

At the gate in Charlotte, the flight attendants told everyone to get off the plane and that the gate agent would inform us as to when we could reboard. (We should have listened for the plane door to slam behind us.) The gate agent didn't have a clue as to what the flight attendants were talking about and placed a call while we milled about. No, the plane was not going on to Boston and all of the people on the plane were going to be rerouted to other flights - go to Special Services please. Turns out there were only 23 people left on the plane and some bright spark decided to cancel the flight (for monetary reasons perhaps?).

At Special Services, Christopher G. pulled up our record and informed us we had been put on the 10:00 p.m. flight to Boston (we had arrived at the airport at 10:00 a.m.). He then mentioned it was too bad we couldn't go to Providence, because there were seats available on the 7:55 - "We can go to Providence!" So he moved us to that flight, wait listed us for First and gave us a travel voucher for a taxi to take us to where we were going. He was polite and kind and reasonable - a shining example of what customer service could be at US Air.

Nice flight to Providence and no sign of our luggage when we got there, for some strange reason it never left Charlotte!

The dictionary definition of civilised is:

"civilised - having a high state of culture and development both social and technological

Unfortunately our experience didn't have a high state of culture in either the social or technological fashion.

But, that is the state of travel today (you thought I was just having a travel rant, didn't you?!) and if your ideal lifestyle involves travel, situations like the above will be encountered - the travel experience is not a civilised one. You can become frustrated and angry by it (as many of Friday's passengers were) and let it spoil your trip. Or you can realise that travel often is uncivilised and prepare for it. If you were heading off into uncivilised and uncharted lands, you wouldn't head out unprepared, right? Consider an airport in the same category, uncivilised in its social and technological capabilities, uncharted in that your experience is anything but well mapped out and predictable.

I once read that happiness occurs when your expectations are lower than your experience: 'Happiness = Expectations <>

No Wonder Americans are Enormous

Percent of Obese (BMI > 30) in U.S. Adults

Percent of Obese (BMI > 30) in U.S. Adults

What a difference 20 years makes. These two charts (from the CDC) show obesity rates in 1989 and in 2009. Not shown are the increases in obesity associated diseases. The change in 20 years is rather significant, don't you think?

Why a post about the growth in obesity rates? This blog is about making the most of your 750,000 Hours. It's tough to make the most of those hours if you're too heavy to be active or ill. Our healthcare system is enabling us to have a lifetime that is 20 to 50 years longer than our ancestors', but where is the value in that if you're housebound or confined to a wheelchair in a nursing home - 20 years of that doesn't sound much like an ideal lifestyle or personal paradise - it doesn't even sound like living to me. So for those wanting to make the most of their 750,000 Hours, taking care of one's health and even more importantly preventing disease all that much more important.

I do pay a lot of attention to health and doing the things that will keep us in the condition necessary to enjoy this lifestyle we've chosen. We've spent a lot of time learning to cook and eat well, understanding what nutrients we're getting and what we need, and the impact of being more active. Steve has lost 60 pounds and I've lost 20 so the approach is working. A big aspect of this knowing what we're putting in our mouths and being really, really careful about what we choose - our choice is gourmet and as close to nature as possible.

One of the things that we're really careful about is sugar. No sugar goes into what we cook or what we eat unless we absolutely cannot avoid it (using a bit of sugar to activate yeast in bread making, for example). That is not to say we never eat sugar or sweets, but we want to choose when we eat sugar rather than having the choice taken away from us by a manufacturer or restaurant adding sugar in all our foods. By chosing when we eat sweets and not including sugar in foods which are not sweet, our taste for sweets is greatly reduced and our ability to detect added sugar in foods is greatly increased.

Since we've come ashore here in Florida, we've noticed sugar in almost everything we've ordered at restaurants - and not just a little sugar, but enough to make things sickly sweet. Bread is sweet. Sauces are sweet. Cocktails are sweet, sweet, sweet! I ordered a frozen lemonade cocktail yesterday that had teaspoons of sugar in it, it was frozen liquid sugar. It was too sweet to even drink, I sent it back.

When I provisioned the boat for our trip, it took me hours in the grocery store because I kept finding sugar or added sweeteners in the ingredients lists. I don't want sugar in savory foods!

If there is this constant ingestion of sugar, before one even gets to dessert, what impact is that having on obesity and on health? We're tasting sweetness everywhere, whether it is labeled as sweet, having sugar or is hidden in the ingredients list (or not!). It's unnecessary and it's having a big impact on people's health - the health you need to have a great 750,000 Hours rather than a really long, boring wait for death.

Steve always says, "If it didn't come out of the ground and it wasn't running around, don't eat it." I think we'll stick with that.

Watch the Telly or Earn Your Freedom - A Time Spend Choice

--------- Time Spent Per Day ---------
Year	Men	Women	Teens	Children

2000	4:11	4:46	3:04	3:07
2001	4:19	4:51	3:04	3:12
2002	4:22	4:58	3:09	3:10
2003	4:29	5:05	3:07	3:14
2004	4:26	5:07	3:07	3:16
2005	4:31	5:17	3:19	3:19
2006	4:35	5:17	3:23	3:26
2007	4:35	5:14	3:21	3:25

Four to five hours a day on average watching television (according to Nielsen Media Research) - I have to take out my calculator! In ten years that's 18,250 hours, in twenty 36,500 - a pretty significant chunk of one's 750,000 Hours!

But a more important exploration is why do people spend all of that time watching television? Is it so fulfilling that we want to spend 5 hours a day on it or is it simply there? Is it a comfort after a hard day's work? Is it a soothing treat after working a job we don't enjoy? Have we simply not thought of a good alternative to hours in front of the telly?

Here's one alternative. Five hours is actually about the same amount of actual 'work' time that is put in at one's day job (after meetings, breaks, training, etc.), it's a significant amount of time. What if you designated some (or all) of that TV time as Freedom Time and used it to earn your freedom to do what you want? Here's a few initial thoughts on things that could be done with Freedom Time:

- Start your own business (doing something you love) - 5 hours a day is equal to the amount of 'work' time put in by many people during their day job (after meetings, training, etc.)
- Start writing for profit
- If you don't have a clue what to do, start researching how you could earn a second income
- Get your finances in order, focus in and figure out where your pennies and pounds are 'leaking' out of your pockets
- Find ways to earn an income off the things, knowledge and experience you already have.

Telly time or Freedom Time, two different choices - and two different destinations...

Re-Encounter of the Mall Kind

It's very interesting being back in 'civilization' (although I don't think that word means what we think it means) and feeling the old consumption urges. I thought after being out of things for 5 months, those spending desires had disappeared. While on the boat, I had no desire to go shopping and certainly wasn't interested in going to a mall.

What a difference a place makes! Welcome to Fort Lauderdale, Florida, a consumption Mecca designed to entice you spend all your pennies and then some! This experience really drives home why it is so difficult to step off the spending treadmill if you're still in the same spending place.

I can't put my finger on exactly what it is, but I've been having a craving to go to the mall! Now I haven't watched any TV and haven't read a paper so that's not it. I don't have anything on my list of need-to-buys or even on my list of want-to-buys. Do you suppose there's some subliminal messages posted around town, 'You need to go to the mall', 'You must go to the mall' - perhaps posted right next to traffic lights?

So we decided to go with it and went to the mall. As we walked in the door, Steve commented, "Demon place, designed to separate you from your money" in his best Sean Connery voice. And boy, is the Galleria Mall here designed to get you there and then once you're in the door, hook you in but good. The surroundings are so nice, why would you want to leave? (I do have to say the gold swan faucets with wings in the bathrooms were an interesting touch.)

Nice surroundings or not, they are designed in every aspect to get you to spend. Now if you get a lot of value and enjoyment out of time at the mall and think that is a great way to spend one (or many) of your 750,000 hours, then spending time at the mall would be an appropriate choice for you. However, for every hour you spend at the mall - if you're spending any money and you will be - then you also have to include the time you work to earn that money to spend. So is a couple of hours at the mall worth losing two of your 750,000 Hours plus the 3-5 you'll have to work to pay for your little expedition?

That's how we end up staying on the treadmill, we think nothing of hitting the mall for a couple hours and dropping $100, but for many folks that's 4-5 hours of work. Multiply that over the course of a year and instead of moving towards your ideal lifestyle, you're moving further and further away...

P.S. As Steve predicted, we were soon parted from our money - we couldn't escape the mall without spending! I think we'll stay outta there!

End of the Keys and Cays Cruise - 2008 / 2009

We've come to the end of what we're calling the Keys and Cays Cruise - To the eastern edge of the Bahamas (next stop Africa) and back again! And what a trip it's been!

There were several points along the way where we almost gave up and said, 'This is too hard' and went home. The learning curve was far steeper than we thought it would be and we had some very painful (and humbling) lessons along the way. We're used to knowing what we're doing, for goodness sake, and found it very frustrating when we didn't know how to or couldn't do things in the way we expected.

Quite frankly, we were unprepared for the weather reality and at times found it frightening. We should have known more, but then again we read every book / blog on the subject that we could get our hands on so perhaps we're a bit hard on ourselves. I do think we tend to take making mistakes or not knowing things harder than some would and beat ourselves up unnecessarily. Some would just shrug those things off and we tend to agonize over them.

Taking the break after the shake-down cruise and going back to England for a breather was the right thing to do. I'm so glad the UK government insisted that I be present for my citizenship ceremony! It gave us a chance to regroup, get our heads back on straight and think about what we wanted to do without also having to think about the weather, anchoring and how to do this or that.

The decision was to keep going, to give it another shot and do what we set out to do - and we are so glad we did! We made it all the way out to the Exumas and back. We did what we had read and dreamt about for so long.

And after the shake-down cruise, it was 'less hard', I don't think I'll ever say living aboard (versus 'going sailing') is a walk in the park. We were more confident, had been exposed to some of the things we encountered before (so it wasn't 'all' new) and also we were out of the dead of winter. Things are much nicer and easier to bear when it's 80 degrees out rather than 40!

When we took our UK break, we decided to have the summer back there. We were talking this morning and if the decision point were right now, we'd keep going right up the coast. We have a great summer planned with all sorts of adventures so I'm not disappointed, but if the decision point had been now it probably would have been different. Anyhow, we'll really be looking forward to coming back next fall!

With all of its ups and downs, it has been a fabulous trip! One of the highpoints of our lives and we're so thrilled that we've had the opportunity to do it. It's made us grow in ways we never even considered and we've seen things that we'd only read about in books.

Just a few of my particular high points:

- Sitting in a bay with the Miami skyline lit up before you was pretty darned impressive
- White Cay while it was just our own deserted anchorage
- Allens Cay for gently getting used to snorkelling and the funny iguanas
- Exuma Park and lying out on the deck watching the starry sky (we will, however, take a mooring ball on the inside harbor next time and avoid the bouncing experience)
- West Bay for its beauty and calmness in an easternly blow
- Staniel Cay was my overall favourite for loads of reasons - beautiful sea, beautiful surroundings, snorkelling with the coral and the fishes in Thunderball Cave, Club Thunderball and the restaurant at Staniel Cay Marina, and the glimpse into the Bahamian way of life.

(I'm sure Steve will post his, he's long overdue for a blog post!)

The experience has been life changing (I did say a while ago that sailing changes you). The time to step away from the hurly-burly and think about what's important to us has been especially valuable. We're clearer and more focused than we've been in a very long time, but calmer. Confidence has been restored and it's grown - if you can make your way alone across a rather big piece of ocean, where else could you go?!

All Tucked In

After a couple of rather warm and busy days, the boat is all put away for the summer. It looks quite naked with no sails on and none of our 'stuff' all over the deck. But it's tucked in behind a bridge and in the shelter of a huge condo way up the New River so fingers crossed that it stays safe and sound until we return in the fall.

We've had fun exploring Fort Lauderdale, what a consumption Mecca this is! Big houses, big boats, big cars - the economic crisis doesn't seem to have made it here.

The beach is lovely. It's one with a walkway in front and the condos / hotels across the street rather than the big buildings blocking your view of the sea. The whole place is riddled with canals (I guess so everyone has an individual parking spot for their yacht rather than having to keep it in a marina) and each canal is lined with gorgeous houses. Lots of great places to walk, with really good views for beaky people along the way.

We were up in time for the sunrise this morning and were having breakfast overlooking the beach as it came up. Still had a bit more to do on the boat so we went over there for a bit to wrap things up until it got too hot to do anymore. We decided at that point we were done and we weren't going to do any more!

My camera is on the fritz so we stopped in at Wolf Camera to find out what is causing it to focus and focus and focus, but not take any pictures. This is a desperation situation because tomorrow we leave to go up north to see the US family and I must take at least 100 pictures while I am there or it won't be a proper visit! A very knowledgeable guy at Wolf diagnosed a problem with the lens and told me I could use the camera and lens manually. At which point, I demonstrated my total lack of camera knowledge and asked, "Uh, how do I use it manually?" I know, my ignorance is sad but true - and today, embarrassing!

Tonight is a last dinner out in Fort Lauderdale and tomorrow we fly up to Boston. Checked weather.com and it looks like 60 degrees and rainy - should get us all primed for the north of England!

One Day Closer to Friday

Received an email message with a cheery "It's one day closer to Friday" headline - at least it was meant to be cheery.

That means out of a 7-day week, you'll spend 4 waiting for Friday and one waiting for it to be the end of Friday. That's using 120 hours of your 168 for the week waiting for 48 or 71% of your time waiting for something to come.

Sounds like waiting to live rather than living...

Mortons for $9, Plus Wine

We're currently in Fort Lauderdale, putting the boat away for the summer and running around town getting things done. We're also in celebratory mode, having finished this year's cruise (Keys and Cays 2008/2009). We happened to drive by Mortons Steak House and thought, 'Oooohhhh, wouldn't that be nice?!'

Mortons is well known for having very nice steak and seafood. They also have yummy tomatoes with blue cheese. And, of course, an excellent selection of wines.

When we were in consultancy-work mode and before we moved into this lifestyle, we would have made the reservation and thought little of the rather large price tag associated with what is a very nice meal, we would have been 'treating ourselves'. But we're no longer interested in paying $200 for just one meal. Eating out is expensive. However, we did really have a craving for Mortons style meal!

One of the great things about living this lifestyle is the surroundings are often gorgeous and that's what we have now with where the boat is. Nestled right on the New River in downtown Fort Lauderdale, a stone's throw from the Performing Arts Center. We can sit in our cockpit and watch the yachts cruise by and the lights of the city come on. Sounds like the view from a really nice steak and seafood house, doesn't it?

I have noticed with a lot of the restaurant food that we tend to order that it is really easy to make (this does not apply to Chinese food, however, we're still working on that). At Mortons or at similar steak / seafood houses, we would have a big hunk of grilled beef or fish, a lettuce wedge or the lovely tomatoes with blue cheese, and a bottle of nice wine. Well, wait a minute, there's a really nice thick snapper fillet from the fish that Steve caught (bet it's fresher than you'll get at many an expensive restaurant) and we found some bright red tomatoes along with some blue cheese at Publix. After a bit of a hunt in our provisions, we found a nice bottle of wine. Sounds pretty much like what we would have ordered at Mortons, doesn't it? A little blackened seasoning, some homemade blue cheese dressing, a bit of time watching the world go by on the back of the boat while barbequeing and voila! One 'Mortons cockpit dinner' for two!

I tend to spend a bit of time on this cooking thing, but if I can have an equivalent or better meal to Mortons for $9 (plus wine), that means I can have 20 'Mortons' dinners. The key words in that sentence - 'equivalent or better meal' for 1/20th the price. Now not all restaurant meals are Morton's priced, but $100 for dinner for two isn't that unusual and $50 certainly isn't, so the numbers may be 1/10th or 1/5th - still a significant savings. And not everyone has snapper fillets lying around, but you can always find a great hunk of meat or fish on sale if you watch for it. The point is still the same, expensive restaurant quality at a radically lower price. It's a way of making this lifestyle even more enjoyable and sustainable. You can 'treat' yourself without it blowing a hole in your ready cash.

Overall, it's a simple way to increase the pace of getting to one's ideal lifestyle, to really enjoy the journey while you're on your way and ensure that once you get there, you can stay!

Living in Lauderdale and We Took Showers!

Last night we had SHOWERS! Now this ordinarily would be a non-event, but
you must understand the difference between boat showers and land showers.
Boat showers are the ultimate in water conservation - quickly get wet,
quickly turn off the water. Lather up, quickly rinse, quickly turn off the
water. Pump out the bottom of the shower. End of shower. No luxurating in
cascading hot water on the boat. Boy, did I luxurate last night! Standing
under uninterrupted hot water - wow, how fantastic is that! It's amazing
how non-events can become something to celebrate when they are no longer
commonplace.

We are now moored in our boat's new home where it will live for the next
five months while we head back to cooler climes for other adventures. We
had a good, interesting trip in. After an overnight in a great cove (that
we will go back to), we headed up the New River for Cooley Landing Marina, a
mere four bridges and two miles away. New River is narrow, lined with
multimillion dollar homes and multimillion dollar yachts. It's really
narrow, wide enough for just one boat in some places. It was very
interesting trying to manuever our wide, slow boat up the creek - especially
considering what you might bump into!

When we do these new things (such as manuevring up a narrow river for the
first time), I'm driving this big awkward boat and it can get a bit tense.
My rule is if 'they' are behind me then I pay absolutely no attention to
them. I don't care if they're riding right behind the boat, I focus on what
is to the front and the sides. That's enough for me to worry about and
they're responsible for not bumping into us. Applying this rule was a bit
difficult coming up the New River as we chugged along at 4 knots when the
Jungle Queen, a big paddle wheeler tourist boat, came up behind us at 6. It
was too big and too noisy to ignore in such a narrow space. We chugged
along a bit further with him looming over us and finally came to a place
which was just wide enough for me to pull over a bit and let him by. Calm
was then restored.

There are 4 and 5 story yachts going up and down this river all over the
place, I wonder (and don't want to find out personally) what happens when
they meet head on in one of those narrow bits where only one boat can get
through?

At each bridge, we had to call the bridge master to open it for us. They
monitor VHF channel 9 and you do have to specifically request that they open
the bridge, they don't just see you coming and open it up. They were very
nice and obliging. After going through them all, we tied up to some pilings
alongside the River House and walked over to scope out the marina.

The slip that they had for us is what's called wet slip storage, essentially
in the water storage for the summer. You're not supposed to live on it for
more time than it takes to close or open it up. It's about half the price
of a regular slip. But (there's always a but), the slip is 'tricky' to get
into. The depth looked okay after we measured it. The issue was getting in
around the bridge bumper barriers (pilings to protect the bridge supports
and keep boat traffic from running into the bridge) in the tide. The guy
from the marina said to wait until an hour after low tide to try it.

At the appointed time, we cast off from our 'staging' spot and headed up the
river. We went past the slip and turned around to come at it from a better
angle. It's sort of like parking a car, it's always easier to come up a
street and cross the lane to a space on the left rather than attempting to
angle into a right-hand spot. I performed a one point turn after we came
through the bridge and we headed back toward the slip. To reduce the
momentum from the tide, I kept throttling back and back...and back and back,
until we were in neutral but still moving. Finally slowed enough so I was
comfortable to make the turn and headed in. The angle was right, we were
sliding in nicely, looked like there would be a gentle touch to the dock and
CRACK! 'What the 'heck' was that?' The tide, still going at a good clip,
had caught the back of the boat and swung it and the dingy into the bridge
pilings. The crack was the noise that a davit makes when breaking in half
and dropping the back side of the dingy into the water.

Och well, my friends from Scotland say. Besides that, it was a fantastic
and very successful day. We encountered all sorts of new situations and
managed to get through them relatively unscathed. And Steve says the davit
can have a couple of holding plates put on and be welded to make it almost
as good as new.

Key learning - pay a lot more attention to the correct tide timing for
entering / leaving a slip, it can have a huge impact (no pun intended) on
how easy or difficult your experience is!

It's a great marina and in a great area, within walking distance of all
kinds of shops and restaurants. We're packing up the boat quickly because
it's getting hot here in FL. Managed to squeeze in some haircuts (more
luxury!) so now we look presentable and a bit less boaty.

What's in this Stuff?

I'm just a bit curious...

We bought this pack of bagels on March 3rd and I pulled it out of the bread
basket today, May 5th. Please note, there is no mold and it looks the same
as when we bought it 9 WEEKS ago. I would like to know what kind of
preservatives are being put into these and don't think I want to put any
more of them into my body.

Canned Tuna Will Never be the Same

Left Biscayne Bay for Fort Lauderdale this morning. We sailed right under
the bridge by downtown Miami and saw the view up close and personal. We
then turned right and headed out Government cut and saw the tankers and
cruise ships up close too. Just looking up on the bridge, we saw more cars
than we saw the entire time we were in the Bahamas!

The boat traffic was fast and furious. We try not to engage too much in the
sailboat snobbery and pasting the powerboats, but I have to say there are
some irresponsible and inconsiderate power boaters out there, particularly
when it comes to leaving huge wakes as they go by. (There might be
irresponsible and inconsiderate sailboaters out there, but since they're
only going 5 knots, who cares?) As we went through the cut, the power
boats were whizzing by on both sides, each leaving a huge wake behind.

It's challenging enough to try and navigate something that is the size of a
40 foot garage through lots of traffic in a narrow body of water. It's even
more challenging when those that pass hurl 3-4 feet of water at you as they
go by!

Anyhow, eventually we 'wake-surfed' our way out to the Atlantic and headed
up the coast to Fort Lauderdale. Had both the jib and mizzen up and managed
to stay in the 5-7 knot range for most of the trip. The seas were very
Atlantic Ocean-y with some big rolly waves every now and then. The
coastline was skyscraper condos and hotels the whole way up.

We spent part of yesterday and this morning trying to arrange a place to
leave the boat for the summer. We tried a bunch of places in Miami, most
were too expensive, but they all did have vacancies! (Not surprising at $4
per foot per day, $160 per night for our boat - if I want to pay Hyatt
prices, I'll stay at the Hyatt - have yet to see any marina with amenities
to warrent $4 a foot!)

Encountering that, we turned our sights to Fort Lauderdale and will check
out a place tomorrow. It's a fun with bridges day with four to navigate
before getting to the marina. We'll anchor in a very nice little harbor
tonight which is surrounded by multi-million dollar homes with boats tied up
in front that make ours look like a dingy! Do the Trumps live here?!

Another fish tale! We're still working our way through Steve's monster
fish. We've had it basted in butter, grilled with blackened seasoning, and
grilled with an oriental lime sauce. We don't have much time left before
the fridge and freezer are shut down and we don't want any to go to waste!
Today I made Snapper Fish Salad (similar to tuna fish salad in the US and
tuna mayonnaise in the UK). We may never enjoy tuna from a can again!

The Best Snapper Fish Salad Ever

Leftover grilled snapper fillet
A couple heaping tblsps of mayo
Blackened seasoning
2 small or one large wrap

Chop snapper and mix with mayo. Add blackened seasoning to taste. Wrap in
a wrap and enjoy the best fish salad ever!

Don't Get Scared Now!

It's very exciting working towards your dreams and when you first embark on them - woohoo! I've done it, we've done it! But what about when the day-to-day reality of living out one's dreams sets in?

Often people put off their dreams for just that reason, because their afraid they won't like the day-to-day reality - what if I'm bored, what if I don't like it, what if I don't like being with my partner that much?! Some folks never go because they're afraid of the answers to those questions. Some folks go anyhow and answer the question on the way. We did.

When Steve and I first left on this cruise we thought we were fairly well prepared for the new lifestyle. We weren't exactly right about that. We had read everything we could our hands on and had been sailing quite a bit. What we didn't understand was exactly what it would be like to stop working and live full-time on a sailboat. The day-to-day reality was not all sunny days and calm seas!

It was much harder and more challenging than our research and our experience led us to believe. About midway through our cruise, we were scared, tired and overwhelmed - who thought this was a great idea anyway?! We felt out of control and it was so different than the way we were used to living.

At work we would have called it the 'change curve', a bathtub shaped curve which describes people's emotional states when going through change. They take a deep dive down the back of the tub, coast along the bottom for a bit and then slowly come back up the front. A bit part of the change curve is that people are often frightened by change, the change is very big and very different and they just get scared. They want to stay where they are or go back to their old, familiar, comfortable lifestyle. Change is too hard, it's uncomfortable! If we were at work, we would have encouraged (all right, pushed) people through the change curve because when they came out the other end things would be better.

Sometimes there is a mismatch between what you built up in your mind and what you really experience. Every day is not 15 knots of wind and broad reachs. We almost pulled a classic change curve stunt and retreated to our old comfortable existence, but we decided to take a short breather, go home for a visit and then come back and give this lifestyle another shot - it was the best decision we ever made! We came back refreshed, reinvigorated and ready to go. We knew more about what we were doing and every single situation wasn't a complete unknown. We were much clearer about our tolerance thresholds and how not to exceed them.

And when we gave it another shot, what was scary before (because we didn't know what was going to happen) changed to exciting and fun!

If we'd given up, we not only would have gone home with our tails between our legs, we would have missed out on one of our best and happiest life experiences - it ended up being even better than we'd imagined!

So if you're living your dream and it doesn't match with what you'd pictured, give it a good try and then come back and try it again. Sometimes it takes time to develop the skills and the experience you need for your new lifestyle. Then, when it clicks, your new lifestyle is better than you ever dreamed!