Right before major life changes, I get this feeling….
What the fuck am I thinking?
Usually, I bring these major life changes upon myself. And most of the time they involve moving across the country. More often than not they happen quickly and without a lot of prep.
Each time, I leave a really good life behind.
My move to Minnesota for college was scary AF. I left all my best friends and a city I grew up in.
My move to NYC was even scarier. I left behind a community I’d built in Minneapolis with $800 in my pocket.
My move to SF was sad and scary because I’d left incredible people and a comfortable job behind in NYC.
My move to Boulder was exciting and scary because I’d left behind a really good job and great apartment in SF to start my own thing in a city I’d never been to.
Right now I’m in the middle of my move to Denver. I’m leaving behind a beautiful town with comfortable jobs I worked hard to get. There’s green space and mountains and the best Whole Foods I’ve ever been to.
So back to that WTF feeling. I had it during our last night in our Boulder apartment. Why am I leaving all this behind for something that’s totally unknown?
Here’s why.
If the life you have at this exact moment isn’t the one you want for yourself, the only thing you can do is change. EVEN IF YOU HAVE A GOOD LIFE.
You’re certainly not going to get what you want by staying put.
In order for change to happen, you have to make the first step. Maybe you’ll get lucky and wait for change to happen to you, but you might be waiting a while. And it might not be the change you want.
And while all of my moves were scary in their own way, the bigger leaps I took, the greater gains I experienced. There were mistakes in there, sure, but it’s funny how you forget those after enough time has passed.
I’m going to go ahead and reread this email to myself every time something in our new house breaks (seriously how did these people live here) and every time we get a new bid from a contractor ($20k to redo a bathroom ARE YOU NUTS) and every time I find a dead bird in the yard (okay it happened once BUT IT HAPPENED).
The thing I’ll remember most about my last week in Boulder is how much banana bread I made. Seriously, loaves of this shit came out of my kitchen. I sent someone the recipe today so sharing it here with you in case you need a little banana bread in your life (you do).
Moving To Denver Banana Bread
Start making 1 hour 15 minutes before you want bread
3 mashed bananas (make sure they are big, about 1 cup total)
1/2 cup greek yogurt (I used full fat but whatever works)
1/2 cup canola or unflavored oil (you can probably use melted butter too)
1 cup sugar (I used granulated but brown sugar probs works great)
1 tsp vanilla
2 eggs (room temp)
1 3/4 cup all-purpose flour
1/2 tsp salt
1 tsp baking soda
1 cup chocolate chips
Preheat oven to 350F and butter a 9×5 loaf pan with butter. Hot tip – use room temp butter if you can. Melty or too-cold butter will make the bread stick to the pan.
Mix first 6 ingredients together until combined. Add in flour, salt, baking soda and mix until JUST combined. Meaning you can’t see any flour, but do not over mix. If you over mix you die.
Optional chocolate chips go in at this point. But why eat banana bread without chocolate in it?
Bake for 50-60 minutes. Check on it at 50 minutes and use a toothpick to see if it’s done. When done, pull out of the oven, let rest in pan for about 10 minutes then tip it over onto a wire rack to let cool out of the pan. Or just eat straight from the pan you animal 🙂
