Your world will be annihilated... We are 300 years away. Beware earthling, your days are numbered.
This is my own paraphrase of the key threat of the novel The Three-Body Problem. The first time I encountered it, the timescale immediately sent my brain whirling. Most fictional threats demand immediate action. The question of how one prepares for something 300 years away is much more interesting.
After I thought about it a bit, I realized that there are often distant problems lurking in our everyday life. Our own aging process is the perfect example of something that is not urgent but will certainly require our attention.
So at what point does something that isn’t urgent become important enough to act on?
I recently finished reading The Uncool by Cameron Crowe. His mother was always adamant that he would become a lawyer. He mostly agreed with her, though he had a few opportunities to write and contribute to various rock magazines as he was finishing high school. Eventually, those small opportunities fueled a career that carried him all the way to the Oscars. He won an Oscar for Best Original Screenplay for Almost Famous. That night, at the table, with the award displayed proudly between Cameron and his family, his mother reminded him once again that he could still apply to law school and that it’s never too late.
In my own life, I’ve been working as a Registered Massage Therapist for 11 years now. When I got into the profession, I knew that my time was limited. I entered a physically demanding profession knowing I wouldn't still be doing it in my sixties. I was only twenty-three when I graduated from school, so I knew that future Jack would eventually have to deal with a career change; I just never anticipated that the day would actually come that I needed to address that concern.
I’m struggling because I’ve built a life that I love. I work for myself. I set my own hours. I enjoy complete freedom and autonomy over my day. I genuinely enjoy being of service to my patients, and I am completely content with my income and earning potential.
As a twenty-three-year-old massage grad, I originally imagined massage to be a short layover before the big career of my life. And yet somehow, it’s been an incredibly long and rewarding career.
Recently, I went through a breakup. I moved into a small apartment and relocated my business. I have some debts to pay off. I’m now focused on that goal. There is a timeline. By the time I am debt free, I will be much closer to the expiry date of my massage therapy career.
Cameron Crowe transitioned from rock journalism to film directing and screenwriting. I’m sure there was a messy middle as he pivoted from one career to the next, but he didn’t give it a lot of space in his story. I wanted more of the messy middle.
Hell, I’m in it now, and I don’t know where to go next.
When you know that what you’re doing now won’t get you over the finish line, but it’s working more than well enough for today, how do you prepare for that coming change?
I always tell my patients to dip their toe in before they commit. But in my case, that likely means temporarily giving up some income and stability, so how do you decide how to make the transition?
If you’ve gone through a major transition while the old thing was still working, I want to hear about that in-between period.
Did you start building the next thing while the old thing was still working?
What did “dipping your toe in” look like before you were willing to commit?