Entry #3: Making Space

I was terrified.

There’s no poetic way to dress it up. Leaving my steady job to go travel Central America for 10 months was not a whimsical, carefree decision — it was a leap off a cliff. And I wasn’t leaping alone; I was bringing my family with me, which meant every emotion I felt leading up to that big jump was magnified. After all, it wasn’t just my comfort I was stepping away from – it was my children’s routine, our tight-knit community, and the ease of the familiar.

For the past 12 years, my job had been my anchor. It gave me structure, stability, and a clear path. But there was always another passion whispering in my ear, a craving to give more time to what’s been calling to me, a persistent pull towards the unknown, and as we all know – the unknown can be scary.

Fear has a funny way of masquerading as logic. It tells you things like:

“I’m being irresponsible.”
“What if nothing better comes along?”
“What if I mess everything up?”
“I should be grateful for what I have.”

And I am grateful; however, there were times I felt stuck, only because from an early age, my heart belonged to something else-writing. It’s what I’ve loved doing most since I was barely double digits. But life has a way of routinely telling you to stop dreaming and just accept what you’re given.

Eventually, I had to start asking myself different questions:

“What am I really risking by chasing what I want?”
“What kind of example do I want to set for my kids? What am I telling them about their own dreams, about pursuing their own ambitions?”

“What if I never find out what’s on the other side of this apprehension?”

“Do I really want fear to be the primary determinant of my actions?”

So, for reasons I’ve already detailed in a previous post, we pressed pause on life and set out to seek adventure, a reset. We booked one-way tickets, packed our lives into backpacks, and have now been in Guatemala for over a month where we’ve been spending time as a family, exploring, volunteering – all still with no plan other than to be present, to discover, and to trust that space — real space — might make room for something new.

And that’s what happened.

Not long into our trip, I received an unexpected message. Someone, who had seen some of my recent work, recommended me for an opportunity. That recommendation turned into a job, a job calling for me to write the pilot for a new animated series. Even writing that last sentence, I had to pinch myself.

Despite a massive case of imposter syndrome, I got straight to work. There was no time to question it. I was given a job to do, so I wrote. I wrote at dawn, before the kids got up, then again after they went to bed, and sometimes I’d squeeze in a few minutes while they played with other children in the village. There was no set time, no routine, no retreat, no locking myself away; I simply had to jump through the windows whenever they opened for me. It was random, chaotic, but at the same time it was beautiful. And throughout the whole process, something became clear: none of this would be happening if I hadn’t made space for it.

Now, this isn’t a post about magical thinking. I’m not advocating quitting your job on a whim in hopes the universe starts showering you with gifts. I’m simply sharing an example about the power of intentional space — the courage to let go of something good in order to invite something better.

Full disclosure, my wife had long been urging me to do this. Her faith in taking leaps into the unknown far exceeds mine, and after reading her a rough draft of this post, she smiled at me with knowing eyes, giving me a look that lovingly said, “I told you so, plonker.”

We often cling to what we know, not because it necessarily fulfils us, but because it feels safe. And safety certainly has its place. But growth? Growth requires risk. It takes saying goodbye to comfort long enough to see what might show up when we’re not white knuckling the steering wheel.

This week, I submitted my script for the pilot, and I’m pleased to share, that after a few agonising days of nervous waiting, it was positively received. And of course, I’m proud – not just of the work I created, but of the fact that we, as a family, chose to listen to the whisper, to that quiet voice that said, “It’s okay to take a chance. It’s okay to fall on your face. It’s okay to give stuff a go just for the sake of seeing what happens.”

In the end, I suppose I’m writing this for those of you who might be on the precipice of something uncertain — be it a career change, a creative calling, or just a nagging sense that your life needs a shift. And to those standing on that edge, I invite you to simply ask yourself, “What might actually happen if I just made a little more space?”

Vaya Con Dios,

Tim