living goals.

After college I was faced with the big question of where and how to live my life. It was so exciting to have many options open to me. While I am glad I chose the option I did, I am also looking towards the future and getting very excited for next summer when I am faced with that freedom again.

All this future stuff has me thinking about what would make my ideal life, so I've made this handy list about how I would ideally live. This list will definitely be helping to inform how I'll create my life next year with a bus, but I am also trying to incorporate as many of these things as I can into my current life.

So anyway, the list.

Off the grid.

I would ideally like to use less energy in my day to day and even better I'd like to be generating that energy myself. 

Mobile.

After college I sat around trying to decide where I wanted to go. Portland? Seattle? Bay Area? Realizing I will have that decision facing me again next year I decided I don't want to make a permanent choice. I'd much rather be able to live in lots of places! I'd also really like the ability to take off for a month and live in the middle of nowhere, on the road or maybe just back in my home town. 

Affordable.

I think this one is pretty obvious, but I'll go into it anyway. In college I was lucky enough to live in an affordable and beautiful house with some wonderful roommates, but moving to the bay I've realized most housing is not affordable. For what I can/want to pay I'm not getting much. I've heard that you should budget half of your paycheck to housing, which I accepted for a while, but now I'm not. I don't want to be working all the time to pay for a house I won't be in. I also hate the idea of wanting to buy a house some day and having to pay way more than it is worth by way of interest. Why do all of that when I could just build my own house and own it outright?

Companion.

God damn it I want a dog. 

Things.

I've got a lot of things. I've always had things. My family has things. We like our things. Moving away from college was ridiculously stressful as far as getting rid of things. I still get anxiety about it, feel guilty for getting rid of some things and not of others, its no fun. When I moved down to California I think I was pretty practical. I originally moved down with one suit case and one backpack. I've gained a bit more from family visiting and bringing me things and from some packages from home, but I think (read: hope) that when the time comes I'll be able to pack up one car's worth of stuff and head back to dear old Oregon. The point of this is- I still like my things but I think I'm getting better. I'm appreciating quality over quantity and enjoying what I have instead of wanting more. 

Independent. 

This is something I've been struggling with, debating about and getting multiple opinions of. I like being alone. I'm an introvert and would much rather spend time by myself than with others. In college I always said it was good I lived with other people because if I didn't I would never come out of my house. I still think that is true and if I hadn't had that encouragement to actually go out and do things my college experience would have been much different. However I also have been making efforts to stop thinking about being an introvert as being a bad thing. I do not have to go out of my comfort zone to do things that don't actually make me happy just because other people say I should. I think it is time to live alone.

♥
Mer.