My Spouse and I Give up Jobs to Travel for a 12 months; Still Doing It After 4 Years

As my spouse Julie and I hiked alongside the rugged shores of Acadia National Park, the scents of pine and sea salt felt intoxicating. I could not assist however smile as my troubles melted away.

At the time, we had each been working collectively on the identical firm for practically 30 years, elevating 4 children alongside the best way. Although we had been grateful for the regular revenue and advantages, the hectic, nonstop grind led to burnout.

This feeling of unease solely intensified when a number of of our associates acquired information of significant well being situations shortly earlier than or after retirement. Those scares shook us and made us query why we had been saving all our desires for “later” when there was no assure we’d attain retirement in the best way we imagined.

After returning dwelling from that journey, we took a tough have a look at our future. The thought of taking a yr off to journey sounded unrealistic, however the considered ready one other decade felt even riskier.

Once we dug into our funds, we realized that years of frugal dwelling had quietly given us extra flexibility than we anticipated.

So, six months later, once I was 51, and Julie was 48, we stop our company jobs with the intention of taking a one‑yr break to journey — not understanding it could finally flip into 4 years.

Travel opened the door to our second act

Scott McConkey

A number of days after leaving our jobs, we packed the automotive and drove from our dwelling in Ohio to Niagara Falls, persevering with by way of Vermont and New Hampshire to soak up the New England fall foliage.

We spent practically two weeks wandering by way of painted forests, stopping at small cities, and letting the tempo of our outdated lives fall away.

Before heading dwelling, we lingered alongside the Finger Lakes, sipping wine and soaking within the views. Without a care on the earth, we took every second because it got here, laughing, smiling, and having fun with one another’s firm as we found new locations and experiences.

When we bought dwelling, we instantly began planning our subsequent journey and sharing tales concerning the expertise with our family members. After seeing our footage, our associates had been struck by how stunning the locations we visited had been, and inspired us to doc our travels.

Their enthusiasm caught with us, and as we deliberate our second journey to Arizona, we determined to be extra intentional about capturing video and turning our experiences into useful journey guides.

Julie created a YouTube channel to share the movies from our journeys, and I began a journey weblog the place I wrote guides for the locations we visited.

Neither of us had ever created content material earlier than, and we weren’t particularly tech‑savvy, so there was undoubtedly a studying curve. Simple duties took us longer at first, however we step by step improved with every journey.

Scott McConkey

As we settled into our new life-style, I felt reinvigorated. Our travels opened us as much as unbelievable experiences throughout the nation, and in addition helped us to search out higher pleasure within the quiet moments at dwelling. Making espresso and strolling the canine introduced me a sense of peace, they usually not felt like chores that needed to get finished between work.

This feeling started to observe me all over the place we went. During a visit to the Oregon Coast, we stood on Cannon Beach at sundown, and it hit me — Julie and I had been completely satisfied. In that second, I knew I did not need our journey to finish.

We delighted within the windswept shores, towering sea stacks, and historic lighthouses, and I returned dwelling decided to stretch our hole yr right into a significant second act.

With a number of tweaks to our journey fashion, we determined to maintain going

Scott McConkey

In order to increase our hole yr, we knew we would need to make a number of modifications to our present fashion.

For instance, to present ourselves extra time to create content material and cut back bills, we scaled again from month-to-month journeys to about eight or 9 a yr.

We additionally labored onerous to diversify the sorts of journeys we had been taking, crossing off the nationwide parks on my bucket listing and the cruises and Disney parks on Julie’s.

Luckily, content material creation additionally gave us some additional revenue to work with — and have become a facet gig we each cherished. It felt surprisingly liberating to create one thing just because I loved it, and it opened my eyes to the opportunity of a second profession I had by no means allowed myself to think about.

Nowadays, our revenue is certainly lower than it was once we had been each working full-time jobs. Julie works a distant half‑time job, and I earn a small revenue from the journey content material I create. Still, we have by no means regretted taking the danger that has introduced us so many rewards.

Over the previous 4 years, we realized we do not have to be outlined by our careers, and reinvention is completely doable, even when which means beginning over in your 50s. And now, we lastly have a life that looks like our personal.