I knew from my first week in Toronto that it wasn’t the place for me.
However, it took me six years, one death, a breakup, and the loss of my dream job for me to buy a one-way ticket out of there.
It was never my intention to settle in Toronto, but when love had called, I’d answered. The partner I’d met while living in Australia had a job there. We decided we’d stay here for a few years, then move back to the country where we’d met.
Still, I had a hard time acclimatizing to the concrete sprawl, especially after living in the lush Australian landscape and growing up surrounded by the rugged natural beauty of British Columbia.
If I was going to stick this out, I realized I needed to appreciate Toronto for what it was — a commercial hub. I set my sights on the ultimate distraction: professional fulfillment.
Luckily, I’d landed a contract job I loved in tech marketing in Toronto. I found that if I focused on work, it was easy to ignore other problems and pretend I didn’t miss living near the ocean.
For a while, focusing on my career helped me ignore parts of my life that weren’t working
After several contract extensions, I was finally offered a permanent role on my dream team, but something felt off.
On one hand, I was doing work I enjoyed with people I liked and respected. On the other, the gap between my partner and me had become a chasm, and our plan to move back to Australia together felt less likely the closer it got.
I had achieved the career goal I’d spent a year hustling toward, yet I was deeply unhappy. So, I decided to spend a month in Canada’s Pacific Northwest.
Surfing in Tofino, I realized I hadn’t been in the water for six years. I hadn’t done a lot of things I loved or taken any steps toward my lifelong dream of learning to sail.
I’d put all my personal ambitions and passions aside to be in a city I didn’t like, in service of someone else’s dreams, and wound up pouring myself into work as a coping mechanism.
I began to wonder, if I didn’t live by the ocean, doing these things I loved so much, who was I? And if my partner decided he didn’t want to leave Toronto, where would I go?
I still wasn’t ready to face reality, so I returned to Toronto and focused on the thing I knew would keep me tethered: my job. I turned into an ostrich, burying my head in my work, unwilling and unsure of how to fill the void.
After a restructuring and a breakup, I finally pushed myself to a new place: Ireland
Sometimes, when you’re ignoring your intuition, the world stops nudging you and starts shoving.
I was good friends with my coworkers, so when the group chat started to buzz while I was on vacation, I took note. One by one, my former teammates were pulled into meetings to notify them of their termination due to restructuring. I felt for them, but I was also relieved I wasn’t on their team anymore. I felt safe.
When my manager texted me to ask if I could hop on a quick call, I was a bit surprised but thought it was nice of him to notify me of the staffing changes while I was on vacation.
I wasn’t prepared to be part of the restructuring. Or for my relationship of seven and a half years to end the day after I got back to Toronto. Or for my beloved grandma to die not long after.
Sometimes, life shoves so hard the tether snaps.
That’s how I found myself lying on the air mattress in the spare bedroom of the Toronto house I’d grown to loathe, wondering where to go next.
For me, doing something new had to start with going somewhere new.
I knew I needed to be by the water again, a place with accessible hiking, surfing, and nature. And, most importantly, I had to be somewhere I could get a visa as an unemployed person over 30.
Eventually, I set my sights on Ireland, a country I’d never visited. I secured a temporary visa and booked my flight for November 8, a date I picked because it just felt lucky.
Eighteen months later, I’m living a 20-minute walk from the beach in Dublin. I have a great tech marketing job again, but without the sacrifice of living somewhere that doesn’t feel like home. I have been surfing, I finally learned to sail, and I have found a vibrant community.
Somehow, with plenty of hope but little expectation, a decision I made on a whim has led to the life of my dreams. Now, I’m working on securing my next visa so I can continue to live in Dublin, where I hope to stay for a long time.
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