Doing It For A Thrill

It is certianly a consequence of the time of year that people come up with crazy ideas about what they have to do in the next phasae of their lives. Not only that, but they feel compelled to ask others what ambitions they may have, as though everyone had some secret master plan.

Having goals, or a big ambition is something I try not to bother with. I just do stuff. A great big ambition hanging over my head to become a ________ (insert noun) would probably paralyze me and then, when I realized I hadn´t achieved that grand ambition, because it was always unobtainable, I would consider myself a failure, which would then make me depressed and therefore even further from reaching aforementioned goal. That must be how self-help books work; they set you up for failure so that you have to buy the next one to get yourself out of the myre.

Instead, I think of something I want to do and try to do it. And I really try to do it, not just some half hearted attempt. And no excuses. Having said all that, I suppose I do have one underlying objective, which on occasion can perhaps make me seem a bit reckless.

For those years after university and a masters, the one thing I had realised is that I didn´t want any of it. I wanted to get out of London. I had had enough with the art word and it´s caprichos. I found that whenever I met new people, I was always drawn to those who had travelled, or lived in far away places, those who spoke different languages, those who were foreign, those who could tell me things I didn´t know, open up worlds that were beyond my reach. I had met people who earned a lot and had big houses, expensive clothes and cars, but I didn´t care about any of it. Being the manager, being in charge, who cares about that if when asked what you have been doing for the past week, the best reply you can muster is ´nothing´. What a shit answer.

My desire to live in another country had been awakened. I had never wanted to go travelling, and wouldn´t have had the money anyway. I didn´t want to just pass through countires, I wanted to live in them, to see if I could be absorbed in to another culture.

And, I had realised what my ambition in life was.

To be able to earn a living in another country I took a course on how to teach English to people who want to learn it. It seemed a simple enough idea, though I didn´t know quite how much it would turn my life upside down.

If you have ever taken a language class, you´ll know that at some point you usually get asked to talk about an important moment in your life, or a life changing event. As a language teacher, when I do this with students it is usually to get them to talk about the past. I have to hope that their lives have been sufficiently interesting to contain such a moment, or failing that, they are creative enough to be able to see the worth in their mundane lives, or are just good liars. I try never to ask students to do things which I couldn´t do, but fortunately, while I didn´t know it at the time, I have one of those life changing events.

That teaching English course led me to Mexico, then to Italy, then to Poland and then back to Mexico, where I remain, with a couple of short stints in the UK in between. Needless to say I have met a myriad of people who would never have been part of my life, had I not wondered in to that building in Green Park one day and convinced the guy to let me pay for the course using two credit cards, a bit of my overdraft and some cash because I was skint. I find it difficult to remember with much exactitude what my life was like 6 years ago, before I became someone who lives in a different country but that was the thing that changed my life.

All those years ago, when I realised what my ambition in life had to be, I had decided that it was to be interesting, to have interesting stories to tell.

Fortunately my objective is vague enough for it to seem like I have achieved it depending on how I tell a story. It is also one that needs constant work, and so keeps me striving.

I am perhaps lucky in that I tend to see what others might think of as mistakes, as material for a good story. It´s not that everything is fun all the time. Far from it; many head aches and much heart ache are born from the you-never-know-unless-you-try school of thought. And, I know that for everyone who thinks what you´re doing is super interesting , there will always be another who deplores your every move. Conveniently, I don´t care.

The only important thing is that I don´t bore myself.