@Penn42 said:

I’m at a crossroads in my life and am looking for advice/stories from people who’ve made similar moves.

I’ve lived in the same state my whole life and the same over-sized university shithole since I moved here 11 years ago for school. I got a decent-ish job after graduating which kept me here in the short term, started a relationship which lasted for 7 years, and now have what I think will probably be the best job (in terms of pay) I ever have.

A confluence of factors has really made it inexplicably clear to me how little Oregon has for me.

First, my relationship has recently ended. This of course is taking an emotional toll and in general I am exhausted right now. It’s also clear that the relationship was one of the primary factors why I am still here. The break-up was somewhat mutual, though she wanted to attempt a re-kindle more than I. We both agreed that we felt we had grown apart more than grown together. I felt I’d been trying to make it work for a while and that in the long run I’d be happier (and I hope she would be too) with a person more aligned with each other’s habits and personalities.

Second, I recently took a trip to New Orleans and it was a little bit of a HUGE revelation for me. Music is and always will be the thing I’m most interested in. New Orleans is the literal birth place of my favorite music and a pivotal place in my second favorite music and the amount of bogh going on there is unreal. I always knew Oregon has no music scene, or if I’m being generous it does have one only it’s insular and incestuous and decrepit. To see a city that not only has an abundance of thriving local talent, but a dedicated local audience who SHOWS UP was something I didn’t really think existed anymore. And it’s for instrumental music with horns taboos, that’s my shit. I’m going back in July to not only see more great music for another week, but to take a more serious look at what moving there would be like, including a taste of summer.

Third, I called my job good above, but that’s only because it pays more than I ever really thought I’d make. The one thing I’m not going to do is allow this job to keep me here long term since other than the pay it is not sustainable in the long run. I feel little to no camaraderie or connection with my coworkers, who are naturally the people I’m around most seeing as the systems we have set up are so lopsided and perverted. The disconnect between my world and theirs has seriously warped my conception of myself socially. I’ve never been particularly adept socially and I can say without doubt that the job has hindered personal progress on this front.

On top of this I have little to no inclination to play the game or climb the ladder after a serious re-tooling. I have financial habits and savings that allow me some flexibility on this front, however I would like to set myself up for part-time work at decent pay sometime in the future. So I’m currently thinking about taking some time here to prepare for a lateral career move before making any too-rash moving decisions.

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I am 30 years old. I’m either going to shoot my shot or not. At the same time I try to temper my current fantasies with a little pragmatism, which is the primary reason I’d like to prepare either partially or fully for a career move before jumping ship. There’s also the geological realities of that city to consider, which depending on how I’m feeling can either be a pro or con in the “move now” column.

I’m also under no illusions that all these problems would be fixed with a move or fresh start, however I can definitively say I’d at least be living somewhere that has something unique to offer me that I cannot get here. Not only that, the cost of living is lower, so I’d essentially be paying less for more.

The one thing Oregon does have is my Mom, Dad and Brother, all of whom I’m very close with. My family outside of those three people I have functionally no relationship with and I have very few friends here anyway, so in that sense I have few ties here, just 3 strong ones.

Major change is coming in the not too distant future for me. The loss of the relationship has really cut my ties to this city to none. I’ve known the job is essentially a bad one from any healthy conception or good & bad for a long time (it’s just the American conception of what constitutes a good job and healthy working environment is totally f***ed, hence calling the job good above). I’m ultimately unhappy here.

If anybody has words of encouragement or caution I’d be happy to hear them. I know that ultimately the worst that could happen is I move there, fall on my face after some amount of time, and move back, but I’ve never been one to make a decision without some thought. Hell I can’t show up at a Phish show without ticket in hand, haha!

I don’t work in front of a computer. I’ll be able to check things on my phone a couple times throughout the day but won’t have time for thoughtful responses until tonight, though I promise replies and engagement are coming!

Thanks for starting a great thread @Penn42

I say make the move. Your fear just means your human and stepping out of your comfort zone and into the unknown, which is always scary. I think it’s true that when one door closes another one always opens.

I will never forget the feeling in my bones when my plane took off from New York City for Tucson, Arizona, where I was going to go live for a couple months at a yoga retreat center and then go to India for a month for more yoga/Buddhist stuff. I was 28 years old and there was a deep sense of Saint of Circumstance:

I Sure Don’t Know What I’m Going For
But I’m Going To Go For It For Sure

After not getting into a graduate program that would have brought me back to New York City, I committed to completing a four year program at the yoga retreat center and living a total of 7.5 years in different parts of Arizona. I was a yogi so I scrapped by financially, piecing together work alongside yoga teaching gigs, but I lived my life, like Frank Sinatra, MY WAY, and it has served me well. Fortunately in my case I had a really strong community around me, yogis taboot which meant incredible people of body, mind, and spirit, that acted as a kind of safety net which allowed me to survive and thrive.

I moved back to the NYC area after 7.5 years to care for my ailing parents and it was really amazing to step back in the area I grew up after that time living a much different, off the beaten path life than my childhood friends. I was able to have experiences and gain wisdom and hard knocks and travel a ton in a way my friends who never left the NYC area did not. Now most are all tied to big mortgages and have children and big jobs that will likely keep them where they grew up the rest of their life. I think highly of many of them and are proud to call them friends but I also feel by never leaving home they don’t have nearly as broad a perspective of life as I do (as incredibly arrogant as that sounds). Of course they know all kinds of things I don’t by virtue of their character and career and interests and have talents I don’t have etc. but I do think so much is gained by living in different parts of the country and by taking risks like you describe.

After spending 6 years back in the NYC suburbs and burying my parents, I moved to my wife’s hometown of Charleston, SC to raise our son and be close to her parents. While it is not cross-country and Charleston is the most progressive part of the state, there’s definitely cultural difference and 778 miles between the NYC area.

It’s true what Jon Kabat Zinn says, “Wherever you go, there you are”. It’s also true that one really is a product of their environment and changing up environments really does help one learn and develop so much.

I say make the move Penn42 !