I want an irresponsible life.
I want to make plans on weekdays without fearing my bedtime. I want to go on weekend trips and not worry about what’s coming on Monday. Matter of fact, I want to live a life where I don’t dread my Mondays. I want to make career choices that make me happy more than they make me money. I want a life where my workweek is as exciting as my weekend. I want to live an adventurous life more than I want to live a stable and profitable one.
People say that your twenties are for figuring everything out. I’m 25, and I feel that intense pressure. However, that quest of self-discovery is littered with people who will arrogantly tell you that they already know what’s best for you. For example, a fairly vocal population concludes that if your quest for self-discovery doesn’t end in a stable office job, a white picket fence, and a desire to be rich, then you must be doing something wrong. Why? Because that’s the American way. Live your carefree life in high school and college, then buckle down to focus on money and stability.
But what if I don’t think that’s my path? I tried to get into corporate life. I’ve been a consultant for three years, since graduating. I’ve worked for several companies, with several bosses, and done many types of work. Don’t get me wrong, some corporate environments were way better than others. But, at the end of the day, I always found it difficult to genuinely care about my work. I cared about it in the sense that I wanted to do a good job, I wanted a promotion, and sometimes the work dipped into my interests, but I never thought my work was helping the world in the way I wanted to. Beyond a nice paycheck, occasional interest, and a relatively stress-free work environment, I never got deeper satisfaction from my responsibilities.
And this isn’t for lack of success. I work in a skilled field with creative tasks, high earnings, and comfortable career growth. But I couldn’t buy into the idea that Excel, PowerPoint decks, and rapid-fire emails were my long haul. Even though I liked it just fine, I thought I’d be wasting my time if I chased the life it offered.
And that snowballed into other realizations. Buying a house and getting that white picket fence felt suffocating. The resulting 30-year mortgage looked like a coffin to me. It also seemed impossible to fit all of my travel and adventure into 20 days of PTO. The “right” path just didn’t fit in with my desires.
In short, I realized that maybe the “get a stable 9-5 even if it sucks, buy a nice house, and have kids before 30” lifestyle isn’t for me. I wanted to try a different path, not because I wanted to bum around, waste my time, and get less out of life, but because I wanted more out of life.
I’ve done every responsible thing in my life. I went to college, got a degree, secured a job right after graduation, and have worked that job until now. The responsible path earned me good money, stability, and the feeling that I was doing the “right” thing. That was, until I looked around and realized I wasn’t fulfilled. I wanted to do work that interested me, work that really helped people. I wanted a break from the “responsible” mindset that brought me a mediocre life.
But some people think it’s a bad idea.
Why do People Think it's a bad idea?
Thanks for asking. There are many reasons why people crave stability, routines, and monotony more than adventure, serendipity, and impromptu plans. I think I can boil most of it down to four things: fear, comfort, materialism, and misinformation.
I’ll put a disclaimer right here so I don’t offend anyone – some people enjoy office life, their job, and even if they know they have to sacrifice for their job, it’s worth it for the life they want to build. That’s perfectly fine. I just want to talk directly about the many people who have accepted that they don’t like their work life, but they do it anyway.
American culture and adult superstition have effectively concluded that a “fun” life is incompatible with a “productive” life. Furthermore, a productive life is synonymous with a profitable life, and due to America’s obsession with consumerism, a profitable life is also a “good” and “easy” life.
There are a lot of problems with that paragraph you just read. I’m sure you caught on with the obvious one: a life focused on productivity hacks, chasing money, and working until you’re burnt out isn’t actually a fool-proof recipe for a good life (at least not in my opinion). And that’s not just because you probably aren’t going to become a multi-millionaire. I believe this is true even if you do get wealthy because you likely just wasted the best, healthiest years of your life for paper. People often conclude that a fun, adventurous, and vagabond life can’t also be profitable and productive – which just isn’t true, as I’ll explain soon.
An adventurous lifestyle makes some people uncomfortable. Almost 40% of the US workforce is office-based, meaning stability, repetition, and structure are cornerstones of work life. Year-round, most Americans have regular 2-day weekends, work the same hours every day, and benefit from their jobs being “stable” (I say “stable” in quotations because stability depends on burnout, laid offs, outsourcing, or being replaced with technology, which isn’t rare). Stability is most people’s living, and it likely bleeds into other facets of their lives. It affects their social lives, free time, plans for the future, and more. It’s incredibly difficult to have an “irresponsible” personal life if you have a routine-focused work life.
Consumerism is also a driving force in how uncomfortable an adventurous life seems. Hyper-consumerism plagues America, and it’s only gotten worse with social media. We’re naturally inclined to desire status, and modern status is defined by how much we can buy. Even though most people will never be millionaires, it’s uncomfortable to give up that dream.
Accepting you may never become rich feels like admitting defeat, especially at such a young age. As John Steinbeck famously said, “The poor view themselves, not as an exploited [class], but as temporarily embarrassed millionaires.” That temporary embarrassment makes most people feel they’re missing their destiny if they quit the rat race… that is, until they realize too late that the millions aren’t coming.
I try to be constantly aware of time. Whether I’m wasting it, whether I’m doing things now that will keep me happy in the future, whether I’d be happy with my life if my future was cut short. That, coupled with feeling stuck in my cubicle-based life, made me ready for a change.
Discovering I wanted an Irresponsible Life
I don’t want you to think I “just don’t get it” when it comes to money. I majored in finance and I work for one of the largest banks in the world. I also focused most of my life thinking the same things as the people I just railed on. My ideal work life was a carbon copy of the Corporate American Dream. I wanted to rise up the ranks, make a lot of money, and eventually buy myself a life of leisure. I knew that meant throwing away my twenties and probably most of my thirties and forties, but I didn’t care. The chance at riches enticed me, and I believed that a stable life was the right life.
I did dream about living an adventurous, “irresponsible,” life, but I had a deluded idea of how to get there. I only wanted that life if it was through earning my millions. I wanted my shot at the wealth, the huge house, the fancy brands, and the expensive meals. I even remember learning that other countries have higher rates of happiness than America only to counter it with “Yeah, but we have more rich people.” Looking back, I don’t know how I allowed money to rule my life for so long.
At some point, however, things changed. I didn’t turn green with envy when seeing enormous mansions, they looked vacant and gross. Fancy brands seemed frivolous and overrated, especially if they were horrible for the planet. I discovered the most expensive meals didn’t hold a candle to the $8 pad thai at my local hole-in-the-wall restaurant.
I realized I was giving up everything I really wanted out of life – all for a dream that didn’t sound fulfilling anymore and wasn’t even promised. At some point, I realized THAT lifestyle was what sounded irresponsible.
I stopped thinking money could buy my freedom and dreams. I stopped thinking my life would be better if I could buy a $5,000 suit (after all, once I get one, there’s just going to be a $20,000 suit I want more). Instead, I realized that my dream life could be lived right now, if I was willing to break the right rules.
There is likely a way to do all of the “irresponsible” things I want to do in responsible ways. After all, whether something’s responsible or irresponsible isn’t based on the decision itself, but on your own goals and how dedicated you are to following through on them. A perfectly crafted plan to leave my job and travel could be less irresponsible than a poorly crafted plan to cross the street.
All my life, I thought of ski bums, backpackers, and outdoor fanatics as people who weren’t successful. That wasn’t for any other reason than because I didn’t know of a way to make decent money without an office job. The very idea of quitting corporate life was equivalent to the idea of living in a box. That’s dramatic of course, but never in my wildest dreams would I assume that leaving the corporate world to live and work at a ski resort might give me a raise. But yet, that’s likely the case for many people.
There are countless examples of outdoor, seasonal, and stereotypically hippie-esque jobs earning average or above-average pay. Do you want to spend the winter working as a ski instructor or server? Congrats, you’ll likely earn upwards of $20/hour plus benefits and employee housing that only costs around $400/month with food plans. Do you want to work for the National Parks Service and spend your years in the most beautiful places in America? Congrats, the average salary for NPS workers is almost $74k/year vs the national average of >$60k. Are you interested in working remotely and buying a van or bus? As long as you’re a true minimalist, you probably just figured out the easiest way to own a house, lower your monthly expenses, and earn a sizable ROI when it comes time to sell.
So How Do I Live Irresponsibly, Responsibly?
Another great question! The best advice I can give is to let go of all your pre-conceived notions and look at everything with fresh eyes. Be honest about what you want for yourself and don’t assume you can’t do something until you prove yourself wrong. The more you know about yourself and the changes you’re making, the better you’ll create the best life for yourself.
Here are the best tips I have for you:
- Learn the “but.” Almost everything is possible in this life, but it comes with a “but.” You could skydive without a parachute – it’s possible. BUT, you’ll die. Likewise, you could quit the job you hate but you have to make money somehow. So learn the “but” that comes with your dream. The more you understand it, the better you can work around it.
- look into creative options for housing. Workaway.info is great if you’re willing to “earn your keep” to get free housing. Some hosts have pretty interesting projects that you may enjoy! Coolworks.com is a great website if you want to find jobs that offer housing in very cool places like national parks, islands, and mountain towns. Facebook marketplace, Craigslist, and other off-beat apartment-searching sites are nice as long as you are aware and comfortable with the risks of a potentially untrustworthy landlord. Also, it’s pretty easy to find parking for a van or small bus if that’s a housing option for you 🙂
- Look at your finances ~holistically~. Take into account the money you’d make and the money you’d spend. Yes, you might be making $35/hour in Los Angeles, but you’re likely spending thousands more on food and housing than someone making $25/hour in a national park with subsidized housing. Wealth isn’t just about how much you earn, but also how much you spend.
- Have multiple backup plans. While preparing to move to Bozeman, I’ve considered almost every possible scenario: one where I love Montana, one where I hate it, one where I decide to go back to corporate life after my short-term job ends, one where I want to keep exploring, and several more. Think through every possible scenario and have a plan. The last thing you want to be is stuck.
My Next Irresponsible Steps
My life changed when I realized that a traditional life wasn’t the life I wanted. I wanted an irresponsible life. There are so many rules I blindly followed until I realized those rules were for a life I didn’t even want.
I’m sitting on my couch on a Saturday night writing this blog. It feels so good to know that I finally enjoy working late. I’d never do this for my day job, but I do it happily for this project. It makes me confident that I’m making the right choice by choosing something else for the time being.
Of course, some people think I’m making a mistake. Honestly, if no one questioned my decision, then it’s probably not a big enough change. But there’s something so inspiring about the people who think my irresponsible steps are worth it. Sometimes they’re my age and they dream of the same things I do. Sometimes they’re much older and wish they did a few things differently. Some offered connections, some offered advice, and one even offered me employment if money ever gets low.
Something isn’t irresponsible just because it breaks a rule. It’s not irresponsible just because it leads to a life that’s unstereotypical. Something’s only irresponsible if it leads you toward something you don’t want, or something harmful. For some people, that might be quitting their jobs to move to Bozeman. For me, it would have been keeping that job.
Don’t get lost in what other people think is best for you. Just find out what you want, do everything in your power to plan and minimize risks, and go make irresponsible choices in the most responsible way possible.
