If anyone had told me years ago that one day I would be living off-grid I would have laughed. It was not something that had ever crossed my mind.
My journey was quite the conventional one. School, university, first job with big tech giant, promotion. After six years in that job I was making good money working on early versions of stuff we take for granted these days. Unfortunately, however, I wasn't very happy. I dubbed what we were doing as “toys for the boys” Different people have different drivers for change. For me, it turned out that values were a big part of it.
Making a break
After a lot of looking I left that job and moved over into the not-for-profit sector. I wasn't making anywhere near as much money, but I was a lot happier. Looking back now I don't regret that move. Most of the things I had been working on never saw the light of day - the company was beaten to it by other (in hindsight better) solutions. In contrast systems I put in place at the charity were used on a daily basis and save a lot of donor money, which was better spent on addressing real issues. My work-life balance also improved.
“The journey of a thousand miles starts with a single step”
What I didn't realise at the time, was that decision put me on the path that would eventually lead me to where I am today. Several years down the line I took another brave decision, and left full time paid work entirely. Going self-employed was a tough choice, but one I really don't look back on either.
From here on out our journey got even more unusual. The changes followed thick and fast. What we were doing needed lots of travel. Deciding to home educate the children seemed an obvious choice. We'd either have had to pay loads of fines or put them into a boarding school we couldn't afford and resign ourselves to never seeing them. So they came with us. I didn't get the first stamp in my passport until I was over twenty. My kids have been to more than that many countries.
Going Mobile
In late 2019 we took another step I never saw coming. We bought a motorhome. The plan was to travel and work our way around Europe. It never happened. Instead we found ourselves locked down in place. In the end we lived in that thing for nearly two years.
In my next few posts I will talk a bit about decision making. In our case the decision was made for us. We never intended to live off-grid. It just happened. For now, however, we have endorsed that choice. I'm not say that we won't go back, but for the moment we have decided to stay.
Join the conversation
Over the last few years lots of people have commented on our lifestyle. We get lots of questions. So we decided to start this blog. Maybe you are interested in improving your work life balance. Maybe you are thinking about how to live more sustainably. Perhaps you are even contemplating moving fully off-grid. Whatever your interest we'd love to have you along the journey. Feel free to ask us any questions. We'll try and write articles to answer the ones we can.