If you or I die when we’re 83 years old*.
We will have lived for 1,000 months.
When I first released this.
I had already used 540 of my 1,000 months.
So I reflected…
I had houses.
Businesses.
Awards.
Money.
A partner.
Dogs.
And cats.
Some mattered.
Some didn’t.
I was swimming hard and I was ahead.
But I was swimming in pretty much the same direction as everyone else.
And I know deep down that’s just not me.
I realised I was doing what I and others thought I ‘should’.
I wasn’t doing what I was born to do.
I was waiting.
For something.
I just didn’t know what.
The Diary of a Man That Stopped Waiting.
So one day.
I stopped waiting.
And in one, 60 month phase in my late 40’s.
I sold my house.
I closed all my businesses.
I started new businesses.
And I had my first baby.
I’m still finding out what happens when you stop waiting and start doing.
So far, I’ve been paralysed with fear.
Felt completely lost.
Marvelled at the kindness of strangers.
Been proud of my own resilience.
Pushed my creativity and curiosity to the limits.
Cried with happiness.
Cried with sadness.
Embarrassed myself by ‘writing out loud’ in this online diary, what I was thinking and feeling.
And (so I am told) I’ve helped a few people by that very same ‘writing out loud’.
Which is nice.
I’ve also embraced wholeheartedly the heady, unique mix of anxiety and adrenaline that comes from not having a clue what I am doing.
In fact the only thing I know for sure is that.
In the 10 years from when I started this blog.
This 50 year old man.
Will become a 60 year old man.
Or a 720 month old man.
All I have to do to achieve that.
Is to not die.
But finding and doing what I was born to do?
I don’t know about that.
But as I launched this online diary.
On Thursday July 26th 2018.
I was exactly 50 years old.
So here goes.
Welcome to The Diary of a Man that Stopped Waiting.
Wish me luck.
*The average life expectancy of a man in the UK, in 2019, was 81.2 years. Which is 974 months.