It's Time to Spill the Bucket: The Story of Bucket Living

It’s been a long time coming.

Maybe I was putting everything away by the excuse of being responsible. But who’s it for?

Recurring question that has been in my head for the last two and a half years. Who’s it for? and What’s it for?

As some of you may know, I’ve been working as a Mechanical Engineer for last two and a half years at a big corporation. It wasn’t easy. Both working and reaching the solution. Finally, I made my mind. Maybe I can say, finally, I became brave to dig the truth that was hiding deep down underneath of the dirt of conventional life. Now I have enough courage to say it out loud,

No more Cubic Farm for me.

I don’t belong here. I believed that for over two and a half years but I guess I wanted to stay in line like a good kid. Because I was damn scared. Shame on me so called a brave backpacker. However, that was how I educated for my entire life. People I surrounded with are having the exactly same life. Get into a good school, study hard, no break, graduate, get a good job and work there forever and ever. And get married in between. That is what considered as a successful life in Korea. No one cares that you are unhappy. Though, I have done more than a half of the perfect scenario. I went to a relatively good school, I studied my ass off, got two degrees, and I got in one of the most famous companies in the country. In the theory, I should be happier than anybody else but I was not. Not at all.

But, I didn’t just give up on me. I’ve tried really hard to make adjustments in my life to be more happy with what I got. A big fat pay check by horrifying work hours let me travel whenever I had time, even though my longest break is just for 5 days including weekend. I got into the world of travel blog and really devoted myself to it. Friends I met through traveling and blogging became my asset. I found a new passion in jazz dancing. I gave my parents some money every month, and I bought nice things for them. I’ve tried to find another way out for this situation. Don’t say I’m throwing all this away by a spur of the moment. I’ve tried, I really have. I have tried to be grateful for what I got. Gratification that force to born, that only gave me more sadness. I am a happy person by nature. I cannot handle that most of my days are filled with sad and anger. I’ve known the solution all along. Better than anybody, I knew I don’t belong here. It’s a time to,

Stop being a coward.

I thought, why this is so hard to just admit and move on to my passion. It is because I consider myself that I’m not a quitter. Responsibility is really important. I believe if I can’t do one thing right, then I cannot do another thing good as well. Quit and move on is not the solution, I believe. That is why I’ve tried so hard to do a good job at work because I don’t want to be a pain in their ass for not doing my job right. However as time goes by, my patience and responsibility reached the limit. I realized I slowly became this little monster saying ‘I don’t care.’ That is not me. I want to like what I do, and I want to be good at what I do over 12hours a day. I’m always reliable, responsible, smart and mature human being in any group of people. I think this was the hardest part and the biggest push to make my decision. I don’t want to be irresponsible. To people who I work with and most of all, to myself. It’s not fair. And I’ve realized that this is not me being a quitter, this is me more responsible for my own life and start the new future. I ain’t no quitter.

Being responsible and positive take a lot of energy. If you are not standing on the stage of happiness, you have to make yourself happy to function, right? Same thing. All the people I am with in my life, personally and professionally, are hard to say happy. Happiness is not their priority in life. What is? you might ask. That, I don’t know. So many people consider happiness is something that you can get if you are extremely lucky. When I said this, most of the conversation went to ‘Who in the world do whatever they want? Nobody.’ So I said ‘No that’s not true and why can’t I try?’ and I got ‘…’. They don’t pursuit happiness, they pursuit.. whatever everyone else does. Being unique is not welcome. I don’t want to spend energy to be positive and happy. I don’t want to be the peculiar one. I just want to be happy and surrounded by happy people who appreciated happiness.

Because I deserve Happiness.

It takes some time to believe I am still who I am and no one could change that. Nothing is wrong with pursuit happiness in person’s life. And it is my life. You know when you hear the same thing so many times then you start to believe that? That happened to me as well. By getting over this speed bump, I’ve heard so many horrible things about who I am as a person, how ridiculous my dream is, criticism about my dear friends, how I am a quitter and a loser, and how selfish I am. That, all from my own family. It is really hard not to believe that once you hear that from your loved ones and over and over again. I was already broken by two and a half years of trying and fixing, and now I became this, the biggest loser in the entire universe who doesn’t give a rat’s ass about family.

This is exactly what I was scared of for the whole time. I wrote ‘It doesn’t mean that I don’t love you anymore’ by frustration at some point. I knew I will be going to listen to this. Did not expect this much worse but I was afraid of an encounter with my parents. Because I knew their belief is exactly the same with what others’. I was expecting a little bit of support, though, but that crashed right after I spill the truth out. Should I blame them? Well, maybe.

Just like my earlier post: When life gives you lemons..? I was devastated. But the solution was simple all along. It IS my life and I cannot change who I am, no matter what. I can fake and try but that’s not going to be me in any way. If someone wants me to be not-myself, those are who don’t deserve to be included in my life. It is my life. I will stand up for myself. Just like the song “Stand” by Rascal Flatt,

When push comes to shove,

You taste what you’re made of.

You might bend, till you break.

Cause its all you can take.

On your knees you look up.

Decide you’ve had enough

You get mad you get strong

Wipe your hands shake it off

Then you Stand.

I will go my way. It sounds selfish but whoever had similar experiences would understand what I said and I bet a lot of you do.

I’m a believer, dreamer and a do-er. I dream and I plan. I’m a happy person and I’m optimistic. I have dreamt so long about the same thing. Honestly, sometimes I cannot say what kept me this long. Now it’s time to focus on this moment rather than dream about long time in the future.