If there’s something out there in life that you really really want - It’s become so hard to say yes first - and only figure things out later.

We’re so afraid of uncertainty and discomfort these days but the truth is, if we’ve got no skin in the game, if we already know something's going to work, if it needs no courage, no leap of faith, it probably also won’t matter.

Just because we don’t like the choices we see, doesn’t mean they aren’t choices.

Our circumstances may be what we are born into, but no matter our circumstances, we always have a choice. We don’t need to reduce ourselves to just reacting to whatever is in front of us, then later wondering how our lives turned out that way.

We can choose to take responsibility for our everyday decisions, choices, actions, and ultimately, the life we live. We can choose to do the hard stuff in life that will move us towards our higher evolution as a person. We can choose to be ok with failure and choose to try again. We can choose to train ourselves to handle risk-taking, and even get good at it. And then, at the end, we can feel great knowing that we put it all out there, because why not?

✨ To give a little more background context, this video was in part inspired by the comments many viewers left on this channel.

Generally our videos evoke 2 main reactions: either the viewer resonates with our lifestyle choices and shares similar aspirations, or the opposite: people saying what we have done is not realistic / not sustainable / not desirable, especially from the financial perspective.

As you may know, how Vitaly & I together reached retirement early and finance our lifestyle in Bali is well documented here    • How I retired at 38 to live in Bali -...   &    • My "boring" simple life in Bali makes...  .

Much of what we share now comes long after the real ups and downs (undocumented back then) of stumbling our way to an early retired life in Bali in our late 30s.

I will be the first to admit that in getting to our life today, Vitaly and I - we were both so fortunate to have started out with many advantages. For me, being born in Singapore, having access to quality education, great opportunities, the privilege of not having financial dependents….

Still, we’ve worked hard all our lives, individually and together, to get to where we are today.

We were also incredibly lucky that no real misfortune befell us along the way. Our hard work actually paid off. The risks we took generally turned out well. Those aren’t things we take for granted either.

Whoever we are, depending on whether one is looking up or down the line, there’ll always be others. There will always be many people way more privileged - who despite their advantages choose to remain on a life path they dislike.

And there’ll always be many who started out with way less, who have reached for what they really really wanted, and often achieved far greater feats than, say, a simple retired life in Bali.

There will always be unfortunate people out there struggling to get by, just trying to meet their basic needs. People beset by systemic poverty, discrimination, ill health, war, bad governments, natural disasters etc.

But for the rest of us, if what’s holding you back is the discomfort of taking risks, going out of your comfort zone and not knowing if something will work, then I hope my thoughts in this video is helpful for you.

Live long & prosper 🖖

Big thanks to @DanHarmon for the beautiful surfing clips of waves at Gerupuk Outside Right. Check out his video of surfing Lombok waves at    • Surfing Kuta Lombok (What's It Actual...  

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Why I choose to “have no ambition” ►    • Why I choose to “have no ambition”  
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