Evolved Thought

Last night we went out to dinner with a woman from the Netherlands that we met during our travels in the Patagonia. She was passing through BsAs at the tail end of her month-long backpacking trip through Argentina, so she sent us an email to see if we could do dinner.

We got to talking about life, and what we wanted out of it as individuals and as women. She told me that about 5 years ago her serious boyfriend (who she is no longer with now) had expressed interest in moving to Asia for work, and that he wanted her to quit her job and come with him. She was just beginning her career, and with no real experience (aside from the foot in the door she had) her resume would not give her much opportunity. So she told her boyfriend that if she was going to give up her career for his dreams, they would have to see a lawyer and draw up an agreement that guaranteed she would receive a portion of his income if anything happened to their relationship. She felt that if she was going to give up her opportunities, she wanted some sort of security for herself in the future. I thought this concept was very interesting.

From there we discussed my plans for the coming months and I expressed my internal conflict between my desire to have a high-power corporate career and my desire to be a humanitarian and travel the world. Right away she expressed that she feels similarly conflicted. In fact, in the Netherlands they actually acknowledge the feeling! Similar to the “Mid-life crisis,” they call it the “30's Dilemma.” Its a period of uncertainty, where you have to make large scale decisions about what path you want your life to follow. As a woman, do give up my career to have a family? Do I put off having a family (tick, tick, tick) for a great career opportunity? Or do I quit my job and take off to see the world?

Hearing her tell me about the 30's Dilemma was so liberating for me. Isn't that so evolved? To actually give value to that period of time. So many women feel their biological clock ticking and they truly have to make these decisions (I'm not forgetting about men, just speaking from what I know). But I think people in the United States (for many reasons I really wont get into here), just blindly follow a path that has been pre-determined for them. College, marriage, house, baby, TV, die. Or some variation of that, without the impetus to truly seek happiness or enlightenment (until its to late – the TV stage – another issue I wont get into here). But what if we actually recognize that there are options? That it is admirable (or even encouraged!) to seek the path less traveled, or more challenging because of the possible benefits? How empowering that would be! We might actually end up with a country of people who smile once in a while, or are grateful for what they have, instead of a bitter, entitled mass of people who end up unhappy because one day they wake up to find they are 50, broke, have 2 kids that hate them, a spouse they know nothing about, and that they spent spent 25 years in denial about their sexual orientation. Talk about a dilemma.

Imagine how many more happy people there would be out there if we actually encouraged people to get to know themselves before diving into a life they are not sure they want? Or allowing people to explore their options before getting married, having children, or burying themselves in a financial decision they can never get out of? I love the idea. In fact, every woman should have to kiss another woman and every man should have to kiss another man before they are given a marriage certificate! Or we can just do what we have been doing...living beyond our means, pressuring our children into marriage and ignoring the issue entirely if its more convenient! (I'm having a blast writing this!)

Oh, how I love the left! And I don't mean the United States left, I'm talking the Netherlands left!