“I always get to where I’m going by walking away from where I’ve been.” – Winnie the Pooh

Walking away can be so, so hard.

Leaving friends who are your tribe.

Leaving the home where your children were infants.

Waving goodbye to family as you forge out on your own.

I’ve done all of the above and none of it was easy.

But walking away from where I’ve been, has gotten me to this moment. A moment where I am exactly who I am supposed to be.

When to Walk Away

When you are ready for change, but unbearably terrified of it, I encourage you to walk away.

When you are staying in place for others when you really want to fly, I encourage you to walk away.

When everyone around you is passionate about their work, but you are bored out of your mind, I encourage you to walk away.

When the holes are round and you are square, I don’t encourage you to walk away. I urge you to run.

Why Walk Away?

Bonnie Ware is an Australian nurse who spent several years working with people in their last months of life. In her book, The Top Five Regrets of the Dying, she shares the things that people most wish they could change about how they lived their lives.

Do you know what number one was?

“I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.”

Please don’t arrive at the end of your journey wishing you had been true to yourself. Don’t climb to the top of the mountain only to stare off into the distance and wish you climbed a different mountain.

Time is a Limited Resource

If you live to be 80 years old, you have approximately 700,800 hours of living.

About 234,000 of those are spent sleeping.

What are you doing with the remaining 467,200 hours?

Are you sitting in traffic while on your way to a job that you hate?

Are you living in a cold climate when each year, you feel like you are dying a little bit more inside?

Are you walking past that box filled with paints or yarn or cameras because someone told you that art is frivolous?

Are you filing down a little bit of yourself each year until you don’t even know who you are anymore?

Your 20 Year-Old Self is Mad at You

Remember the dreams you had of traveling the world? Your 20 year-old self does.

Remember when you said that you would never sell your soul to a corporation? Your 20 year-old self does.

Remember when you laughed at all of the conformers in Conformville? Your 20 year-old self does.

And she is mad at you for not believing in her.

You sold her out for the house, the car, and the white picket fence, but she still has hope that you will remember her. She’s waiting patiently for her moment in the sunshine.

It’s Not Too Late

What will your next step be?

Will you wake up tomorrow, hit snooze and get yourself through the day on a diet of stress and coffee? Or will you choose a new path…a path without regret?

Bonnie Ware says that upon death, “most people had not honoured even a half of their dreams and had to die knowing that it was due to choices they had made, or not made.”

Make better choices. Honor your dreams. Show your 20 year-old self that you are the hero that she dreamed of being. Evolve into the very best version of you.

You can absolutely get to where you are going. You just have to be brave enough to walk away from where you’ve been.

Now get walking….

If you want to read the full book, you can get The Top Five Regrets of the Dying by clicking here.

Oliver Sjöström

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