Is It Really That Easy To Follow your Heart?

Well, I have been thinking about this for sometime now. Many of us, in fact most of us are living a life that’s not ours. We want to do different things but are somehow stuck in the wrong professions. Yes volumes have been written on this already. People have become millionaires by writing about this in their books and giving seminar talks on how to follow your dreams. But is it really that easy? Can a forties guy with comfortable home, loving family and a decent income can suddenly quit his job and start auditioning for movie roles? Or can 20s something guy like me (late twenties actually) drop his job and start following his passion?

It is actually harder than these books make it seem like. There is a always some uncertainty associated with jumping ships. And we, human beings, fear uncertainty almost as much as we fear spiders. And there is no point slamming all wrong decisions on peer pressure or on our parents. Yes parents sometime influence our decision for a particular career but most of the times, we are undecided ourselves. As teenagers or college grads we believe that something is the best  career for us only to find out alter that it is not what we want. yes we don’t know something until we try it. When I started off as a software engineer, i though I was born to do this. After 3 years, well, I am not sure anymore. But the experience was important.

Now it comes to the fact that if I can leave the IT industry. Maybe I can. I wanna be an entrepreneur, a writer, a traveler, a travel writer, there are so many things I would love to do.  But to type up that resignation letter and click the send button is the toughest thing I have ever had to do so far. Some unknown fears gag me whenever I make up my mind. Family responsibilities, social status, peer evaluation, ego, everything comes into play. What happens when I quit? People will think I fled because I could not do the job. I won’t be able to find another job. So far and so on.

Well I can’t take my decisions based on what other people will think But is it really that easy to ignore? Especially when I have not been the boldest or strongest person so far in my life? But I have to do what I have to do isn’t it? For the last six months or so, my mind has become stronger than before. In fact I came very close to submitting that resignation a couple of times. but something always stopped me at the last moment. I am hoping I will soon be able to shake off that last tie that’s binding me to the life I do not want.

I do not know what the future will be like. I guess nobody does. but my heart is telling me to take the plunge. Some have succeeded while doing so, others have failed. I have always known that no matter what happens, I have the necessary education, skills and strength to find my self a place to live in and feed myself three square meals a day. Will that assurance be good enough for me? Well ,I guess I will find that out soon enough. In fact may be sooner than you think.