August 14, 2019 • 33 mins
Veteran Journalist and author of Leap, Tess Vigeland, explains how walking away from her dream career, marriage, and home base helped her find her truest self.
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Speaker 1 (00:09):
The way to generate adventure for yourself is to find
those things that you are unfamiliar with, to find those
things that make you uncomfortable and go and do them. Yeah, Hell, hello,
(00:32):
and welcome to the podcast where we talk about all
things change and be challenged to be open to discovering
the ways in which we could change more productively. I'm
Li Saws with a terrible voice, and I'm chill her sake,
And it is sort of funny that I co host
(00:53):
this podcast with you, Lisa about changed since I am
a fairly change verse person. I had this career that
was just such a sort of steady eddy, slow but
steady climb in the magazine industry until that blew up.
And I was thinking just this morning that, you know,
I love routine so much that when my plans for
(01:15):
tonight God screwed up. I was like, I was totally unsettled.
Clearly I need to learn, continue to learn from our guests.
But you you were good with. You're good with like
last minute change rounds and bigger and bigger shifts too.
I'm definitely flexible um time wise, and I think it
(01:39):
just comes from just an inherent disorganization. It looks like
spontaneity that it's actually just completely disorganized. Just all the
plates crashing all the time is a symphony. Well, a
lot of changes is not orchestrated and it is not planned,
which is why I think our guest today is going
to be grey because as she actually orchestrated and planned
(02:04):
one of the most dramatic shifts I can see in lifestyle.
So I just want to get in and start talking.
Let's do it. Yeah, um, Test Bigland is a veteran
journalist and the author of Leap Leaving a job with
No Plan B to find the career and life you
really want. Test, Thank you so much for being with us. Oh,
it's my absolute pleasure. Thank you. So that was you
(02:26):
had a job not dissimilar from Jills, where you had
spent twenty years in the same industry. Shill wasn't publishing.
You were in a journalism You had probably when one
of the most coveted premiere jobs at marketplace and marketplace money.
You're cruising in your career. Can you tell us about
that a little bit? Yeah, I started in public radio
right out of college. I was fortunate enough to get
(02:48):
a job at Oregon Public Broadcasting where I had had
an internship in my freshman year and it was all
I ever really wanted to do, and I ended up
spending almost only five years in it and ended up
at as you said, Marketplace, which is a global business
and economics program that's heard daily on public radio stations
(03:11):
across the country. And I had wanted to work there
from my earliest days and ended up getting a job
when I was I can't remember thirty one or thirty two.
They're hosting a national radio show. So everything went everything
to plan exactly. And I was a planner, Oh you guys.
(03:32):
I was such a planner like You've never seen a
planner like me, starting when I was a kid, and
I always had these goals and I reached them and
that's what I did with that job. And I ended
up staying there for eleven years and loved it, absolutely
loved it. It could not have been happier, um, But
(03:52):
there were things that were happening in the workplace that
just didn't sit well with me, and I ended up
leave ving. And despite what you said about me organizing
all this and planning all this, actually I didn't really.
I did something entirely uncharacteristic for me, which is I
(04:14):
quit without having a plan. Now, did you have one
of those quitting moments where like, I take this job
and shove it moment? Yep? Did you regret it the
next morning? Oh? I love it though? Well, I mean
I didn't. I didn't. I didn't actually quit that way
in my head. That's what it was, you know. I
(04:34):
didn't want to burn any bridges. Um. So so how
did you very nicely say take this job and shove it?
I said, Um, I said, this isn't working for me
and I need to leave. And I did give them
three months notice. They were shocked because you know, I
had I did have this amazing job. Amazing people in
(04:55):
my industry would have killed for it, you know. Uh.
And and people knew that I loved what I was doing,
but they also knew that I was unhappy, um for
all kinds of reasons. Um. And so yeah, there was shocked. Um.
And the next day did I regret it? No? H.
(05:16):
The first time I really started to have second thoughts
was about a week after my last day, which was
three months later. And when I when I you know,
found myself not going to work and every routine that
I and others like me love so much suddenly yes, yes, um,
(05:38):
and all of a sudden, you know, I realized I
didn't have a purpose anymore, at least I thought I didn't,
and I couldn't figure out how to. I feel like
I was somebody wasn't totally impulsive like when you quit.
Was it one morning, I can't take this anymore? Yeah,
because you hadn't thought at all about what you were
(06:01):
going to do. There was never a moment, oh, I'm
gonna like become a chef or something like that. No.
I mean I honestly thought I would die at the microphone.
That's how much I love the job. There was no
other microphone you could have gone to at that moment.
Probably probably, But I loved what I was doing. I mean,
I'm not kidding. I really I was in my dream job. Literally,
I was in my dream job. So um yeah, I
(06:25):
mean I ended up. I went home on a Friday
afternoon for more sobbing because of something that had happened
that day, and I cried in my backyard in Pasadena
for a couple of hours. Then my my now ex
husband came home and I said, I can't do this.
I have to leave, and I'm sorry. I you know,
I don't know what I'm gonna do, and he said
(06:47):
we'll figure it out. Um, And then you said I'm
leaving you too. Well about three years later. Yeah, you know,
once a quitter, always a quitter. You're like, I'm just
warming up, I'm getting good at this. You're all gone.
I'm tend with all of you and the dogs gotta
(07:10):
go ye by. No, it wasn't like that, but but
I will say that I do think that there's something
I talked about this um after actually after my book
came out, because this wasn't in the book, but that
you know, I think once you experience, once you experience
quitting and you realize it's not going to destroy you,
(07:30):
you look at the rest of your life and say,
what else maybe isn't isn't quite right that I need
to change? Mm hmm okay, So so let's go back
to that like moment of regret and what did you
do next? How did you deal with it that that
one week after actual last day at work, UM, I
(07:53):
went into a deep funk. It was one of the
hardest times of my life, not only because I didn't
have that routine, although that that was really hard. But
because I really started to feel almost immediately the loss
of my identity. And so many of us, I think,
tie our identities to what we do, to our jobs.
(08:15):
And I didn't really have enough kind of outside that.
And I had the super cool job, right Like I
would go to a dinner party where I didn't know
people and they asked me what I did, and I
would tell them and they'd be like, Oh, that's so cool.
I didn't have that cool factor any of the social
currency of our works. Something exactly doesn't doesn't. It drives
(08:38):
a whole lot, motivates a whole lot, I think it does.
And and I, yeah, I had never really thought about that,
about what I would do when I didn't have that aunt,
that cool answer anymore. And um, so that you know,
that started right away because my my my last day
was in mid November, so it was right before the holidays,
and so there were lots of parties that I went
(08:58):
to and people were like, so, and it's that's the
first question everybody asks, right, which is something that I
fight against. Now, what do you do? Hi, I'm so,
and so, oh, what do you do? I don't ask
that question of anyone anymore. Until like twenty minutes into
the conversation, because it's not the most important and interesting
thing about What is the most important and interesting thing
about them? Well, I don't go to the most important
(09:20):
and interesting thing, but I will often ask you, know,
what do you what do you like to do on
your downtime? What do you do on the weekends? Um?
Where is the latest greatest place you visited? Uh? Are
there any books that you can recommend? I mean sometimes
it feels awkward because we're so used to asking that
question about work. But I do it specifically now because
(09:43):
because I don't want that to be the first thing
I know about somebody, because I don't think it is
the most important thing. Yeah, what do you ask? Lisa?
What do you do? And and this was someone who's
never were very rarely had a steady, consistent, easily defineable job,
(10:04):
like usually although you had many cool jobs, kind of
one after the other, I've had. I have had many jobs,
but my title is professional dilottant. That's what I have
on my business card. I think that's what I would
like to be. Next. Alight, when we come back, we're
gonna actually talk about what you did do next. We've
(10:37):
been chatting about the moment to test kind of blew
her life up. Um. But then from walking away from
her dream job, walking away from possibly not a dream
husband into a whole new world, leaving everything behind packing
(10:57):
a backpack. I think you didn't even have a real suitcase,
and moving to Asia like you might as well have
gone to the mood sign yourself up with the Elon
Musk And I mean, what what was that about. That's
a really good question and I haven't quite figured that no,
So so what happened was, Um, I ended up getting
(11:18):
a book deal and writing a book about as you mentioned,
about leaving the job and not knowing what I wanted
to do next. And that book came out in August,
and in the meantime, I was in the process of
a of an amicable divorce and we still talk and
you know, he's a great person, just the marriage needed
to end. Um. So I was without a spouse. Um.
(11:40):
We were in the process of selling the house, so
I didn't have you know, I didn't know where I
was going to live. The book had come the book
was coming out, and I didn't know what I wanted
to do after that. So all of a sudden I
had this inflection point in my life where another inflection
point where I was like, you know what, I kind
of had the opportunity right now to leave and to
(12:03):
go explore for a while. I don't have anything keeping
me here in Los Angeles, so I literally just I
bought myself a one way ticket to Ho Chi Min
City in Vietnam. I picked that because I had never
set foot in Asia, and because I knew it was
going to be cheap and my money was going to
(12:24):
go further. And I just I packed up and left.
I stuck all my stuff in a storage unit that
I just recently retrieved three and a half years later,
and I thought I would be gone for maybe a year.
That's what I was stig like a little toe hauld no, no, nothing,
(12:48):
And that was kind of that was part of what
I wanted to do. I just wanted to get somewhere
and be forced to be uncomfortable and unfamiliar and just
make myself go through that. I don't know why I
wanted that, and that's something I'm still figuring out as
I try to figure out if I want to write
another book about that. Um but no, I just there
(13:08):
was something inside me that was like you need to
go challenge yourself in an just the most enormous way possible. Yeah,
where they don't even speak English. Oh no, it's not
going to Singapore or even Bangkok. Where are they speaking? No?
So I ended up being in Saigon for four months
and then I moved to Bangkok and um I ended
(13:31):
up being abroad for almost three years, and I went
to twenty countries. Basically gave myself this long sabbatical, which
I could do because the house that we did sell
in l A sold for quite a bit of money
and instead of putting that in a retirement fund, I
I went on a grand adventure and um I traveled
(13:51):
mostly solo to all those countries, Uh, India. Did you
create any kind of a home base for yourself that
you traveled from or did you or you know that's
not truly nomatic. No. No, First, I had an apartment
in Sigon for four months, and then um I had
a series of apartments in Bangkok for two and a
half years. And use that as a hub. What would
(14:12):
you do every day when you weren't traveling, when you're
sitting in Because I just got back actually from Vietnam,
and I loved fitting on. I happened to love Hannoy
a lot better than than o Chiman City. But I
was there about a week, and I if I lived
there and I didn't have friends, and I didn't have
a job, and I'd seen all the tourist sites and
(14:32):
I hadn't been run over by a murtor scooter. Yet's
good for you. I don't know what else to accomplishment?
What did you do day in and day out? As
someone who doesn't have friends, doesn't have family, doesn't speak
the language, isn't writing a book. Well. For the first
four months while I was in Psigon, I was traveling
a lot. I went to five different countries in those
(14:53):
four months. Um, But the question is a good one
for Bangkok, and UM. A lot of what I did
I taught myself photography while I was over there, and
so I would spend a lot of days just wandering
the city, like nobody gets to do that usually, right,
and just I would just go yes, and I would
(15:16):
just go to a part of the city that I
wasn't familiar with, and I would take my camera and
my different lenses, and I would practice my photography and
I would just wander around looking for things that were interesting.
Did that help you really see what was around you? Yes? Yeah,
it became like this new a new way of looking
(15:37):
at everything from food to faces, to storefronts, two lights,
to cars. Everything. Um. Yeah, that's a really interesting way
to put that. I I like that. Idn't really thought
of it that way, but yeah. And but I was
also writing, So I would come back to my apartment,
or actually I would go to I had a workspace
(15:58):
that I used, and I would go there and I
would start to make notes for what I hope will
ultimately someday be another book. I don't know how els
gonna take, but um. And I also, while I was
in Bangkok, I ended up making a lot of friends.
I was there long enough. Um, and it is such
an international city that I was able to make a
real wonderful coterie of friends that I spent a lot
(16:21):
of time with. So you're by yourself in a city
like Bangkok, do you just walk up to people and say, Hi,
I'm new here. Can I be your friend? Because I mean,
that's like I was just talking to Alicia about this.
I don't like cocktail parties because I have to go
have the same conversation with someone all of a different person.
It's like roundhog Day for me, where you're like, nice
(16:42):
to meet you, I'm Lisa, what do you do? But
you're doing that with no backup. But it almost makes
it easier, right because nobody knows me. I can tell
whatever story I want about myself, about what I'm doing,
about where I am and why I'm there. Did you
make up stuff? No, well that would be interesting, George.
(17:03):
The only thing I made up ever, was I got
really I was there, you know, starting in December fifteen.
So when people found out I was an American throughout
two thousand sixteen, you can guess what they were asking
me about. And I got really tired of having to
try to explain Donald Trump. So I literally started to
tell people I was from Canada because I just didn't
(17:26):
want to talk about it because I had no understandable yea, um,
but no. So the way I met people was to
two different ways. One, I learned how to scuba dive,
and so when I would go out on dive trips,
I would meet people, um, and a lot of them,
you know, when I would dive in Thailand, a lot
(17:47):
of them were in Bangkok. So then I had a
natural group of friends who were divers. But the second
one was there's this organization called inter Nations and you
can find it in most major cities around the world,
and its gatherings of pets and they have monthly you know,
let's go to a rooftop bar and everybody meet each
other UM or you know, if you if you are
(18:08):
a photographer, you can go out with UM a bunch
of photographers in the city and meet people that way.
So I actually would go to these rooftop bar gatherings
where I knew not a soul, and I would be
forced to go up to them, go just go up
to strangers, groups of strangers and say, Hey, I'm tests,
I'm in town, I'm American. Where are you guys from?
(18:30):
That that actually became the default question instead of what
do you do? It was where are you from? Which
that life is a whole, it's a whole universe, and people,
I think, in some ways get a little addicted to it.
You know, they tap into your money, goes a lot further.
You suddenly don't ever want to come home. Did Was
(18:50):
there anything about expat life that made you think I'm
not gonna want to do this forever? No, and if
I if, the only I will tell you the only
reason I'm back in the States is for job, for money.
If I had, if I had unlimited funds, I would
never live in the United States again. But you could
not because I don't like the US, but because I'm
(19:13):
so I am. I am addicted too being abroad. Um
it is what it does to your brain is so
remarkable in terms of like I I started to feel
like almost almost like Bangkok wasn't enough for me anymore.
Time that I was the happiest. Yeah, exactly, because every
(19:33):
time you walk out the door, it's a it's a
new place. But I found that the happiest I was
was when I would land in a new country and
I would be forced to function, to figure out how
to get myself places, to meet people and to ask
them for help. And I just rived on that, absolutely
thrived on that. And I think there was something in
(19:53):
it that was it was some sort of endorphin thing
that became addictive to me. Um So no, I don't.
I mean, yes, I missed home sometimes that I missed,
you know, little things that I missed having a car.
Sometimes I just wanted to get in a car and
drive and I couldn't do that. But for the most part, no,
there was almost nothing about expat life that I got
(20:15):
tired of. When we come back, we're going to talk
more about what you're doing now. So we've talked about
your big adventure into Asia, and you just said you
(20:38):
would do it all again and you would move back there.
Maybe once your book is finished, you'll you'll do another round.
Um what what what What is in the cards for
you right now? What? What do you besides the book?
What's what's your life like? Um? It's a really it's
a good question. And I don't know what's in the
cards for me quite frankly. And you know, just to
(21:01):
get back to what you guys were talking about at
the beginning of the show, I now really live my
life without a whole lot of planning, and I have
the luxury of doing that. Um. I do have, you know,
an income. I'm doing some work for for actually a
podcast company where I'm doing some some hosting work as
a journalist. But I'm still figuring out what the next
(21:24):
thing is going to be. And that's that would be
uncomfortable for a lot of people. But I've lived my
life the last seven years or so since I left
marketplace in that space of uncertainty, and I actually like it.
And you know, things have happened to me and I've
made things happen that have worked out, and I think
(21:47):
that because I'm open to different opportunities. It's just it's
become kind of this, well, what's coming next for me?
And I and I like that. So, Okay, you're comfortable
with uncertainty, which I admire and think is fantastic. I
guess I'm just curious about whether you feel like there
(22:08):
is some sort of right balance between what most of
us would call real life holding down a job, having
an income, but ideally pursuing something that you like that
feeds some adventuring part of your soul, and also going
on actual adventures where you remove yourself from that quote
(22:30):
unquote real life and you do something that feels like
an escape. Does that model that does that not really
work for you? Do you think it's a construct that
doesn't work in general? No? No, I wouldn't say that,
because I think everyone is different, and you know, I
think that also changes over time for some of us.
(22:52):
Um it certainly did for me, As I said, I
used to be a planner. I'm a plan out every
moment of my day. Um, and I don't do that
at all anymore. Um. But yeah, I mean I would
like to find that happy medium. And I have been
at the extremes and I can't live like that forever.
(23:14):
I mean, well, maybe I could. I don't know that
I want to anymore. I would like to have a
little bit of stability. I would like to know, you know,
I'm a freelancer now basically a contractor. I would like
to know where that next paycheck is going to come from,
you know, at the end of this year, once this
project is done. Um, I would like to have a
four oh one k again. At some point, I would
(23:35):
like to, you know, I I would I think I
would like to have the structure of a workplace again.
At some point. I actually miss it. I missed going
into work and having around alterna family, yeah, work with exactly. Um.
But when that's going to come, I don't know. And
(23:57):
I try not to be too concerned about it because
I'm I'm fine where I am for now. UM. But yeah.
The biggest problem with taking a job like that that
is more traditional, um, with the four one K and
with the colleagues, is that it does make it more
difficult to go and have the next adventure. Um. People
(24:18):
don't generally let you just leave for three months or
six months. It's just not done. If I could find
an employer that would allow me to do that, I
would stay with them forever. Um. But you know, but
I also look and I you know, I I did
what I wanted to do. I actually took that jump,
and I went abroad, and I was gone for way
(24:40):
longer than I ever expected to be. And so I
kind of feel like, you know, if if that doesn't
happen again, if something, if something comes along that is
more traditional and works for me and work, and it's
you know, something that I want to do and feel
passionate about, then if I don't go on another adventure
for five or ten years, that's fine. I at it.
(25:01):
I really did it, and I feel it. You're the
same person at all? No, No, I'm not. Yeah, and
you know so, so I also bring that to this
life that I'm living right now. And you know, when
when I was traveling, I also didn't make plans I would.
I landed in New Delhi, India, and I didn't know
(25:22):
where I was going to go from there in the
rest of India. UM. And that's kind of how I'm
living right now. And I don't know how long I
can do that, but for now it's working and I'm
comfortable with it. When it stops working, when I'm not
comfortable anymore, I will find another way. You've talked about
the job part of it and being pretty much the
only reason you're back is to to have a job again.
(25:44):
But there's also the people part of it, the the family,
the long term friends, that the intimate connections that are
hard to make when you're on the move and you
can have fun with you know, a group of ex
pats of a cocktails, but it's not like the best
friend you need a world cry on, or you know,
a lover. So do you not miss the connection? I
(26:08):
love traveling, but I don't like it when I'm by
myself for a long periods of time. Yeah, but that
that's where the way I traveled was different. And had
I tried, had I just been nomadic, um, I would
agree with that. But because I did, particularly in Bangkok.
I was there because I said, for two and a
half years, and I developed some very very close friendships
(26:31):
UM and I think that happens in part because you
are all in a place that is not familiar to you,
particularly a place like Bangkok where my fellow expats from Pakistan,
from France, from Germany, from Spain, they did not speak Tie.
Neither did I, so but of course they all spoke English. Um.
(26:53):
So I actually made what are now some of my
closest girlfriends in the world, and we all all we
I think that our relationships solidified extraordinarily quickly because of
the situation that we were in. Um that we were
all in this strange place and needed to figure out
how to function there, and so Um no, I mean
(27:17):
I I did. I did have very close relationships over there.
Um do you miss the intensity of that? I mean,
is that something that you can bring home and say,
you know what, I'm just gonna be far more focused
and dedicated to the making of new friends because I
know what you're talking about. That there's there's a totally
(27:39):
different charge in the air when you're meeting somebody abroad.
I mean that the excitement of it and the need
you have for one another is very different from what
we experience when you know you're texting with your friend
trying to figure out a time you can get together
by Yeah, yeah, I know that that's exactly right, and
intense is the perfect word for it. Um As for
bringing that back here, it's it's funny. I when when
(28:04):
I returned to the States about well, it was August
of so it's about ten months ago. I really thought
that I was going to need to go to a
city that I had never been to, like that I
was gonna still need to feed that that that craving
for newness um that I had gotten used to while
I was abroad. So I thought I would go to
(28:26):
some you know, big city that I had never been to.
And then I started to think about it and and
I originally came back to I'm in Portland, Oregon now,
which is where I grew up, and this is where
my parents are and where a large group of old
friends are. And I thought, I'm not gonna I don't
want to live there. I'm not going to go back
to the place that I know that's the exact opposite
of what I want. But then I about two months
(28:49):
into getting home, I started to feel like, you know what,
this is actually feeling really good because I don't have
to work so hard when you are in a new city,
whether it's abroad or you know, right here in the States,
it's a lot of work to find a new community
for yourself. That's really kind of why I'm here in Portland.
(29:12):
It was either going to be here or Los Angeles,
where I also have a community. But I felt that
need for just for it to be easy, because it
was as marvelous as it was abroad, it was also
extraordinarily difficult and taxing. Um. And I just once I
was home for a little while, I was like, Wow,
(29:32):
it's kind of nice a to speak English and be
to be surrounded by people I already know and not
have to go out and meet all those new people.
So that's you know, you would ask, you know, if
I've if I've taken that skill and applied it back
here at home. No, I haven't. Um, I've really just
relied on the people that I already know. Although what
(29:54):
you did bring home was an appreciation for that. So
you can only you can only really sharp and by
putting yourself someplace really uncomfortable for a while. Absolutely, and
I and I do think that's a skill, and I
think it's a skill that I'll be able to apply
for the rest of my life. For people who are
listening and can't, who can't just pack up, sell their as,
(30:16):
leave their husband, start a whole new life and another continent,
What were the big takeaways for bringing adventure and you know,
just a lack of stuck nous and that you could
share with listeners who want that kind of joy that
you had in your in your freedom that you have
(30:38):
without giving everything up. Yeah, it's a really good question,
and it's a tough one because I, you know, I do.
I did come at this from a point of extreme privilege.
You know, I was particularly financially and that's something that
I always talk about because that was that was my
background of marketplace. I talked about personal finance. Um. So
I would say that the way to generate adventure for
(31:01):
yourself is to find those things that you are unfamiliar with,
to find those things that make you uncomfortable and go
and do them. Now, that doesn't mean you have to
fly off to Vietnam. It could mean that, you know,
is there a mountain near you that you can go,
Maybe not climbed to the top of it, but if
(31:21):
you've never gone for a really serious hike, go go
do that. Um, if you've never taken a road trip
more than a couple of hours outside of your hometown,
go do that. Um. If you've never made Indian food,
if you've never tried to make Vietnamese food and your home,
go take a cooking class and try to do that.
(31:43):
I mean, there are all kinds of ways that you
can not just have an adventure but expose yourself to
other cultures, which was the big thing for me while
I was abroad. I just I wanted to experience all
these different cultures. Um. If you're in a city where
there's a night market and you've never been to it,
go to its. Thing I've been intrigued by is Airbnb
(32:06):
and how it's changing our culture. The fact that even
if you're not the person traveling to another country and
air Ben being you can you can open up and
and all these people come flooding in. I mean, it's
not for everybody, it's not for the faint of heart maybe,
but it's you know, it's another way, absolutely, yeah, you know,
(32:26):
and those interactions with people from different cultures are really
what it's all about. Um. And again, sometimes when I
was abroad, the language barrier was the issue, but for
the most part, people who are coming into this country,
UM are going to have some functional ability to at
least have a short conversation with you if they're staying
(32:49):
in your home. So that's brilliant. I love that idea. UM.
The big ambition of mine, Yeah, well, clean enough of
my crap out of my house that I can airb Okay,
we'll definitely do that, you know. And there and there
are so many communities within the United States that are
you know, people from other parts of the world. Go
explore those communities, you know, go to Little Saigon in
(33:13):
l A. Go to um, go to Little Italy, go
to you know, there were all these places. Just just
go and experience those communities in a way that that
allows you to travel without really leaving home. And I
think that that I think that can do it for you.
It's great advice. Thank you so much for widening our world.
(33:33):
Love chatting with you. Oh it's been just a delight.
Thank you to connect with Tests. You can find her
on Instagram at test big Land And I just want
to thank you Test. It's been great talking to you.
I also want to thank Alicia Haywit are fantastic producer
and everybody listening. Thanks so much, we'll see you next time.
The way to generate adventure for yourself is to find
those things that you are unfamiliar with, to find those
things that make you uncomfortable and go and do them. Yeah, Hell, hello,
(00:32):
and welcome to the podcast where we talk about all
things change and be challenged to be open to discovering
the ways in which we could change more productively. I'm
Li Saws with a terrible voice, and I'm chill her sake,
And it is sort of funny that I co host
(00:53):
this podcast with you, Lisa about changed since I am
a fairly change verse person. I had this career that
was just such a sort of steady eddy, slow but
steady climb in the magazine industry until that blew up.
And I was thinking just this morning that, you know,
I love routine so much that when my plans for
(01:15):
tonight God screwed up. I was like, I was totally unsettled.
Clearly I need to learn, continue to learn from our guests.
But you you were good with. You're good with like
last minute change rounds and bigger and bigger shifts too.
I'm definitely flexible um time wise, and I think it
(01:39):
just comes from just an inherent disorganization. It looks like
spontaneity that it's actually just completely disorganized. Just all the
plates crashing all the time is a symphony. Well, a
lot of changes is not orchestrated and it is not planned,
which is why I think our guest today is going
to be grey because as she actually orchestrated and planned
(02:04):
one of the most dramatic shifts I can see in lifestyle.
So I just want to get in and start talking.
Let's do it. Yeah, um, Test Bigland is a veteran
journalist and the author of Leap Leaving a job with
No Plan B to find the career and life you
really want. Test, Thank you so much for being with us. Oh,
it's my absolute pleasure. Thank you. So that was you
(02:26):
had a job not dissimilar from Jills, where you had
spent twenty years in the same industry. Shill wasn't publishing.
You were in a journalism You had probably when one
of the most coveted premiere jobs at marketplace and marketplace money.
You're cruising in your career. Can you tell us about
that a little bit? Yeah, I started in public radio
right out of college. I was fortunate enough to get
(02:48):
a job at Oregon Public Broadcasting where I had had
an internship in my freshman year and it was all
I ever really wanted to do, and I ended up
spending almost only five years in it and ended up
at as you said, Marketplace, which is a global business
and economics program that's heard daily on public radio stations
(03:11):
across the country. And I had wanted to work there
from my earliest days and ended up getting a job
when I was I can't remember thirty one or thirty two.
They're hosting a national radio show. So everything went everything
to plan exactly. And I was a planner, Oh you guys.
(03:32):
I was such a planner like You've never seen a
planner like me, starting when I was a kid, and
I always had these goals and I reached them and
that's what I did with that job. And I ended
up staying there for eleven years and loved it, absolutely
loved it. It could not have been happier, um, But
(03:52):
there were things that were happening in the workplace that
just didn't sit well with me, and I ended up
leave ving. And despite what you said about me organizing
all this and planning all this, actually I didn't really.
I did something entirely uncharacteristic for me, which is I
(04:14):
quit without having a plan. Now, did you have one
of those quitting moments where like, I take this job
and shove it moment? Yep? Did you regret it the
next morning? Oh? I love it though? Well, I mean
I didn't. I didn't. I didn't actually quit that way
in my head. That's what it was, you know. I
(04:34):
didn't want to burn any bridges. Um. So so how
did you very nicely say take this job and shove it?
I said, Um, I said, this isn't working for me
and I need to leave. And I did give them
three months notice. They were shocked because you know, I
had I did have this amazing job. Amazing people in
(04:55):
my industry would have killed for it, you know. Uh.
And and people knew that I loved what I was doing,
but they also knew that I was unhappy, um for
all kinds of reasons. Um. And so yeah, there was shocked. Um.
And the next day did I regret it? No? H.
(05:16):
The first time I really started to have second thoughts
was about a week after my last day, which was
three months later. And when I when I you know,
found myself not going to work and every routine that
I and others like me love so much suddenly yes, yes, um,
(05:38):
and all of a sudden, you know, I realized I
didn't have a purpose anymore, at least I thought I didn't,
and I couldn't figure out how to. I feel like
I was somebody wasn't totally impulsive like when you quit.
Was it one morning, I can't take this anymore? Yeah,
because you hadn't thought at all about what you were
(06:01):
going to do. There was never a moment, oh, I'm
gonna like become a chef or something like that. No.
I mean I honestly thought I would die at the microphone.
That's how much I love the job. There was no
other microphone you could have gone to at that moment.
Probably probably, But I loved what I was doing. I mean,
I'm not kidding. I really I was in my dream job. Literally,
I was in my dream job. So um yeah, I
(06:25):
mean I ended up. I went home on a Friday
afternoon for more sobbing because of something that had happened
that day, and I cried in my backyard in Pasadena
for a couple of hours. Then my my now ex
husband came home and I said, I can't do this.
I have to leave, and I'm sorry. I you know,
I don't know what I'm gonna do, and he said
(06:47):
we'll figure it out. Um, And then you said I'm
leaving you too. Well about three years later. Yeah, you know,
once a quitter, always a quitter. You're like, I'm just
warming up, I'm getting good at this. You're all gone.
I'm tend with all of you and the dogs gotta
(07:10):
go ye by. No, it wasn't like that, but but
I will say that I do think that there's something
I talked about this um after actually after my book
came out, because this wasn't in the book, but that
you know, I think once you experience, once you experience
quitting and you realize it's not going to destroy you,
(07:30):
you look at the rest of your life and say,
what else maybe isn't isn't quite right that I need
to change? Mm hmm okay, So so let's go back
to that like moment of regret and what did you
do next? How did you deal with it that that
one week after actual last day at work, UM, I
(07:53):
went into a deep funk. It was one of the
hardest times of my life, not only because I didn't
have that routine, although that that was really hard. But
because I really started to feel almost immediately the loss
of my identity. And so many of us, I think,
tie our identities to what we do, to our jobs.
(08:15):
And I didn't really have enough kind of outside that.
And I had the super cool job, right Like I
would go to a dinner party where I didn't know
people and they asked me what I did, and I
would tell them and they'd be like, Oh, that's so cool.
I didn't have that cool factor any of the social
currency of our works. Something exactly doesn't doesn't. It drives
(08:38):
a whole lot, motivates a whole lot, I think it does.
And and I, yeah, I had never really thought about that,
about what I would do when I didn't have that aunt,
that cool answer anymore. And um, so that you know,
that started right away because my my my last day
was in mid November, so it was right before the holidays,
and so there were lots of parties that I went
(08:58):
to and people were like, so, and it's that's the
first question everybody asks, right, which is something that I
fight against. Now, what do you do? Hi, I'm so,
and so, oh, what do you do? I don't ask
that question of anyone anymore. Until like twenty minutes into
the conversation, because it's not the most important and interesting
thing about What is the most important and interesting thing
about them? Well, I don't go to the most important
(09:20):
and interesting thing, but I will often ask you, know,
what do you what do you like to do on
your downtime? What do you do on the weekends? Um?
Where is the latest greatest place you visited? Uh? Are
there any books that you can recommend? I mean sometimes
it feels awkward because we're so used to asking that
question about work. But I do it specifically now because
(09:43):
because I don't want that to be the first thing
I know about somebody, because I don't think it is
the most important thing. Yeah, what do you ask? Lisa?
What do you do? And and this was someone who's
never were very rarely had a steady, consistent, easily defineable job,
(10:04):
like usually although you had many cool jobs, kind of
one after the other, I've had. I have had many jobs,
but my title is professional dilottant. That's what I have
on my business card. I think that's what I would
like to be. Next. Alight, when we come back, we're
gonna actually talk about what you did do next. We've
(10:37):
been chatting about the moment to test kind of blew
her life up. Um. But then from walking away from
her dream job, walking away from possibly not a dream
husband into a whole new world, leaving everything behind packing
(10:57):
a backpack. I think you didn't even have a real suitcase,
and moving to Asia like you might as well have
gone to the mood sign yourself up with the Elon
Musk And I mean, what what was that about. That's
a really good question and I haven't quite figured that no,
So so what happened was, Um, I ended up getting
(11:18):
a book deal and writing a book about as you mentioned,
about leaving the job and not knowing what I wanted
to do next. And that book came out in August,
and in the meantime, I was in the process of
a of an amicable divorce and we still talk and
you know, he's a great person, just the marriage needed
to end. Um. So I was without a spouse. Um.
(11:40):
We were in the process of selling the house, so
I didn't have you know, I didn't know where I
was going to live. The book had come the book
was coming out, and I didn't know what I wanted
to do after that. So all of a sudden I
had this inflection point in my life where another inflection
point where I was like, you know what, I kind
of had the opportunity right now to leave and to
(12:03):
go explore for a while. I don't have anything keeping
me here in Los Angeles, so I literally just I
bought myself a one way ticket to Ho Chi Min
City in Vietnam. I picked that because I had never
set foot in Asia, and because I knew it was
going to be cheap and my money was going to
(12:24):
go further. And I just I packed up and left.
I stuck all my stuff in a storage unit that
I just recently retrieved three and a half years later,
and I thought I would be gone for maybe a year.
That's what I was stig like a little toe hauld no, no, nothing,
(12:48):
And that was kind of that was part of what
I wanted to do. I just wanted to get somewhere
and be forced to be uncomfortable and unfamiliar and just
make myself go through that. I don't know why I
wanted that, and that's something I'm still figuring out as
I try to figure out if I want to write
another book about that. Um but no, I just there
(13:08):
was something inside me that was like you need to
go challenge yourself in an just the most enormous way possible. Yeah,
where they don't even speak English. Oh no, it's not
going to Singapore or even Bangkok. Where are they speaking? No?
So I ended up being in Saigon for four months
and then I moved to Bangkok and um I ended
(13:31):
up being abroad for almost three years, and I went
to twenty countries. Basically gave myself this long sabbatical, which
I could do because the house that we did sell
in l A sold for quite a bit of money
and instead of putting that in a retirement fund, I
I went on a grand adventure and um I traveled
(13:51):
mostly solo to all those countries, Uh, India. Did you
create any kind of a home base for yourself that
you traveled from or did you or you know that's
not truly nomatic. No. No, First, I had an apartment
in Sigon for four months, and then um I had
a series of apartments in Bangkok for two and a
half years. And use that as a hub. What would
(14:12):
you do every day when you weren't traveling, when you're
sitting in Because I just got back actually from Vietnam,
and I loved fitting on. I happened to love Hannoy
a lot better than than o Chiman City. But I
was there about a week, and I if I lived
there and I didn't have friends, and I didn't have
a job, and I'd seen all the tourist sites and
(14:32):
I hadn't been run over by a murtor scooter. Yet's
good for you. I don't know what else to accomplishment?
What did you do day in and day out? As
someone who doesn't have friends, doesn't have family, doesn't speak
the language, isn't writing a book. Well. For the first
four months while I was in Psigon, I was traveling
a lot. I went to five different countries in those
(14:53):
four months. Um, But the question is a good one
for Bangkok, and UM. A lot of what I did
I taught myself photography while I was over there, and
so I would spend a lot of days just wandering
the city, like nobody gets to do that usually, right,
and just I would just go yes, and I would
(15:16):
just go to a part of the city that I
wasn't familiar with, and I would take my camera and
my different lenses, and I would practice my photography and
I would just wander around looking for things that were interesting.
Did that help you really see what was around you? Yes? Yeah,
it became like this new a new way of looking
(15:37):
at everything from food to faces, to storefronts, two lights,
to cars. Everything. Um. Yeah, that's a really interesting way
to put that. I I like that. Idn't really thought
of it that way, but yeah. And but I was
also writing, So I would come back to my apartment,
or actually I would go to I had a workspace
(15:58):
that I used, and I would go there and I
would start to make notes for what I hope will
ultimately someday be another book. I don't know how els
gonna take, but um. And I also, while I was
in Bangkok, I ended up making a lot of friends.
I was there long enough. Um, and it is such
an international city that I was able to make a
real wonderful coterie of friends that I spent a lot
(16:21):
of time with. So you're by yourself in a city
like Bangkok, do you just walk up to people and say, Hi,
I'm new here. Can I be your friend? Because I mean,
that's like I was just talking to Alicia about this.
I don't like cocktail parties because I have to go
have the same conversation with someone all of a different person.
It's like roundhog Day for me, where you're like, nice
(16:42):
to meet you, I'm Lisa, what do you do? But
you're doing that with no backup. But it almost makes
it easier, right because nobody knows me. I can tell
whatever story I want about myself, about what I'm doing,
about where I am and why I'm there. Did you
make up stuff? No, well that would be interesting, George.
(17:03):
The only thing I made up ever, was I got
really I was there, you know, starting in December fifteen.
So when people found out I was an American throughout
two thousand sixteen, you can guess what they were asking
me about. And I got really tired of having to
try to explain Donald Trump. So I literally started to
tell people I was from Canada because I just didn't
(17:26):
want to talk about it because I had no understandable yea, um,
but no. So the way I met people was to
two different ways. One, I learned how to scuba dive,
and so when I would go out on dive trips,
I would meet people, um, and a lot of them,
you know, when I would dive in Thailand, a lot
(17:47):
of them were in Bangkok. So then I had a
natural group of friends who were divers. But the second
one was there's this organization called inter Nations and you
can find it in most major cities around the world,
and its gatherings of pets and they have monthly you know,
let's go to a rooftop bar and everybody meet each
other UM or you know, if you if you are
(18:08):
a photographer, you can go out with UM a bunch
of photographers in the city and meet people that way.
So I actually would go to these rooftop bar gatherings
where I knew not a soul, and I would be
forced to go up to them, go just go up
to strangers, groups of strangers and say, Hey, I'm tests,
I'm in town, I'm American. Where are you guys from?
(18:30):
That that actually became the default question instead of what
do you do? It was where are you from? Which
that life is a whole, it's a whole universe, and people,
I think, in some ways get a little addicted to it.
You know, they tap into your money, goes a lot further.
You suddenly don't ever want to come home. Did Was
(18:50):
there anything about expat life that made you think I'm
not gonna want to do this forever? No, and if
I if, the only I will tell you the only
reason I'm back in the States is for job, for money.
If I had, if I had unlimited funds, I would
never live in the United States again. But you could
not because I don't like the US, but because I'm
(19:13):
so I am. I am addicted too being abroad. Um
it is what it does to your brain is so
remarkable in terms of like I I started to feel
like almost almost like Bangkok wasn't enough for me anymore.
Time that I was the happiest. Yeah, exactly, because every
(19:33):
time you walk out the door, it's a it's a
new place. But I found that the happiest I was
was when I would land in a new country and
I would be forced to function, to figure out how
to get myself places, to meet people and to ask
them for help. And I just rived on that, absolutely
thrived on that. And I think there was something in
(19:53):
it that was it was some sort of endorphin thing
that became addictive to me. Um So no, I don't.
I mean, yes, I missed home sometimes that I missed,
you know, little things that I missed having a car.
Sometimes I just wanted to get in a car and
drive and I couldn't do that. But for the most part, no,
there was almost nothing about expat life that I got
(20:15):
tired of. When we come back, we're going to talk
more about what you're doing now. So we've talked about
your big adventure into Asia, and you just said you
(20:38):
would do it all again and you would move back there.
Maybe once your book is finished, you'll you'll do another round.
Um what what what What is in the cards for
you right now? What? What do you besides the book?
What's what's your life like? Um? It's a really it's
a good question. And I don't know what's in the
cards for me quite frankly. And you know, just to
(21:01):
get back to what you guys were talking about at
the beginning of the show, I now really live my
life without a whole lot of planning, and I have
the luxury of doing that. Um. I do have, you know,
an income. I'm doing some work for for actually a
podcast company where I'm doing some some hosting work as
a journalist. But I'm still figuring out what the next
(21:24):
thing is going to be. And that's that would be
uncomfortable for a lot of people. But I've lived my
life the last seven years or so since I left
marketplace in that space of uncertainty, and I actually like it.
And you know, things have happened to me and I've
made things happen that have worked out, and I think
(21:47):
that because I'm open to different opportunities. It's just it's
become kind of this, well, what's coming next for me?
And I and I like that. So, Okay, you're comfortable
with uncertainty, which I admire and think is fantastic. I
guess I'm just curious about whether you feel like there
(22:08):
is some sort of right balance between what most of
us would call real life holding down a job, having
an income, but ideally pursuing something that you like that
feeds some adventuring part of your soul, and also going
on actual adventures where you remove yourself from that quote
(22:30):
unquote real life and you do something that feels like
an escape. Does that model that does that not really
work for you? Do you think it's a construct that
doesn't work in general? No? No, I wouldn't say that,
because I think everyone is different, and you know, I
think that also changes over time for some of us.
(22:52):
Um it certainly did for me, As I said, I
used to be a planner. I'm a plan out every
moment of my day. Um, and I don't do that
at all anymore. Um. But yeah, I mean I would
like to find that happy medium. And I have been
at the extremes and I can't live like that forever.
(23:14):
I mean, well, maybe I could. I don't know that
I want to anymore. I would like to have a
little bit of stability. I would like to know, you know,
I'm a freelancer now basically a contractor. I would like
to know where that next paycheck is going to come from,
you know, at the end of this year, once this
project is done. Um, I would like to have a
four oh one k again. At some point, I would
(23:35):
like to, you know, I I would I think I
would like to have the structure of a workplace again.
At some point. I actually miss it. I missed going
into work and having around alterna family, yeah, work with exactly. Um.
But when that's going to come, I don't know. And
(23:57):
I try not to be too concerned about it because
I'm I'm fine where I am for now. UM. But yeah.
The biggest problem with taking a job like that that
is more traditional, um, with the four one K and
with the colleagues, is that it does make it more
difficult to go and have the next adventure. Um. People
(24:18):
don't generally let you just leave for three months or
six months. It's just not done. If I could find
an employer that would allow me to do that, I
would stay with them forever. Um. But you know, but
I also look and I you know, I I did
what I wanted to do. I actually took that jump,
and I went abroad, and I was gone for way
(24:40):
longer than I ever expected to be. And so I
kind of feel like, you know, if if that doesn't
happen again, if something, if something comes along that is
more traditional and works for me and work, and it's
you know, something that I want to do and feel
passionate about, then if I don't go on another adventure
for five or ten years, that's fine. I at it.
(25:01):
I really did it, and I feel it. You're the
same person at all? No, No, I'm not. Yeah, and
you know so, so I also bring that to this
life that I'm living right now. And you know, when
when I was traveling, I also didn't make plans I would.
I landed in New Delhi, India, and I didn't know
(25:22):
where I was going to go from there in the
rest of India. UM. And that's kind of how I'm
living right now. And I don't know how long I
can do that, but for now it's working and I'm
comfortable with it. When it stops working, when I'm not
comfortable anymore, I will find another way. You've talked about
the job part of it and being pretty much the
only reason you're back is to to have a job again.
(25:44):
But there's also the people part of it, the the family,
the long term friends, that the intimate connections that are
hard to make when you're on the move and you
can have fun with you know, a group of ex
pats of a cocktails, but it's not like the best
friend you need a world cry on, or you know,
a lover. So do you not miss the connection? I
(26:08):
love traveling, but I don't like it when I'm by
myself for a long periods of time. Yeah, but that
that's where the way I traveled was different. And had
I tried, had I just been nomadic, um, I would
agree with that. But because I did, particularly in Bangkok.
I was there because I said, for two and a
half years, and I developed some very very close friendships
(26:31):
UM and I think that happens in part because you
are all in a place that is not familiar to you,
particularly a place like Bangkok where my fellow expats from Pakistan,
from France, from Germany, from Spain, they did not speak Tie.
Neither did I, so but of course they all spoke English. Um.
(26:53):
So I actually made what are now some of my
closest girlfriends in the world, and we all all we
I think that our relationships solidified extraordinarily quickly because of
the situation that we were in. Um that we were
all in this strange place and needed to figure out
how to function there, and so Um no, I mean
(27:17):
I I did. I did have very close relationships over there.
Um do you miss the intensity of that? I mean,
is that something that you can bring home and say,
you know what, I'm just gonna be far more focused
and dedicated to the making of new friends because I
know what you're talking about. That there's there's a totally
(27:39):
different charge in the air when you're meeting somebody abroad.
I mean that the excitement of it and the need
you have for one another is very different from what
we experience when you know you're texting with your friend
trying to figure out a time you can get together
by Yeah, yeah, I know that that's exactly right, and
intense is the perfect word for it. Um As for
bringing that back here, it's it's funny. I when when
(28:04):
I returned to the States about well, it was August
of so it's about ten months ago. I really thought
that I was going to need to go to a
city that I had never been to, like that I
was gonna still need to feed that that that craving
for newness um that I had gotten used to while
I was abroad. So I thought I would go to
(28:26):
some you know, big city that I had never been to.
And then I started to think about it and and
I originally came back to I'm in Portland, Oregon now,
which is where I grew up, and this is where
my parents are and where a large group of old
friends are. And I thought, I'm not gonna I don't
want to live there. I'm not going to go back
to the place that I know that's the exact opposite
of what I want. But then I about two months
(28:49):
into getting home, I started to feel like, you know what,
this is actually feeling really good because I don't have
to work so hard when you are in a new city,
whether it's abroad or you know, right here in the States,
it's a lot of work to find a new community
for yourself. That's really kind of why I'm here in Portland.
(29:12):
It was either going to be here or Los Angeles,
where I also have a community. But I felt that
need for just for it to be easy, because it
was as marvelous as it was abroad, it was also
extraordinarily difficult and taxing. Um. And I just once I
was home for a little while, I was like, Wow,
(29:32):
it's kind of nice a to speak English and be
to be surrounded by people I already know and not
have to go out and meet all those new people.
So that's you know, you would ask, you know, if
I've if I've taken that skill and applied it back
here at home. No, I haven't. Um, I've really just
relied on the people that I already know. Although what
(29:54):
you did bring home was an appreciation for that. So
you can only you can only really sharp and by
putting yourself someplace really uncomfortable for a while. Absolutely, and
I and I do think that's a skill, and I
think it's a skill that I'll be able to apply
for the rest of my life. For people who are
listening and can't, who can't just pack up, sell their as,
(30:16):
leave their husband, start a whole new life and another continent,
What were the big takeaways for bringing adventure and you know,
just a lack of stuck nous and that you could
share with listeners who want that kind of joy that
you had in your in your freedom that you have
(30:38):
without giving everything up. Yeah, it's a really good question,
and it's a tough one because I, you know, I do.
I did come at this from a point of extreme privilege.
You know, I was particularly financially and that's something that
I always talk about because that was that was my
background of marketplace. I talked about personal finance. Um. So
I would say that the way to generate adventure for
(31:01):
yourself is to find those things that you are unfamiliar with,
to find those things that make you uncomfortable and go
and do them. Now, that doesn't mean you have to
fly off to Vietnam. It could mean that, you know,
is there a mountain near you that you can go,
Maybe not climbed to the top of it, but if
(31:21):
you've never gone for a really serious hike, go go
do that. Um, if you've never taken a road trip
more than a couple of hours outside of your hometown,
go do that. Um. If you've never made Indian food,
if you've never tried to make Vietnamese food and your home,
go take a cooking class and try to do that.
(31:43):
I mean, there are all kinds of ways that you
can not just have an adventure but expose yourself to
other cultures, which was the big thing for me while
I was abroad. I just I wanted to experience all
these different cultures. Um. If you're in a city where
there's a night market and you've never been to it,
go to its. Thing I've been intrigued by is Airbnb
(32:06):
and how it's changing our culture. The fact that even
if you're not the person traveling to another country and
air Ben being you can you can open up and
and all these people come flooding in. I mean, it's
not for everybody, it's not for the faint of heart maybe,
but it's you know, it's another way, absolutely, yeah, you know,
(32:26):
and those interactions with people from different cultures are really
what it's all about. Um. And again, sometimes when I
was abroad, the language barrier was the issue, but for
the most part, people who are coming into this country,
UM are going to have some functional ability to at
least have a short conversation with you if they're staying
(32:49):
in your home. So that's brilliant. I love that idea. UM.
The big ambition of mine, Yeah, well, clean enough of
my crap out of my house that I can airb Okay,
we'll definitely do that, you know. And there and there
are so many communities within the United States that are
you know, people from other parts of the world. Go
explore those communities, you know, go to Little Saigon in
(33:13):
l A. Go to um, go to Little Italy, go
to you know, there were all these places. Just just
go and experience those communities in a way that that
allows you to travel without really leaving home. And I
think that that I think that can do it for you.
It's great advice. Thank you so much for widening our world.
(33:33):
Love chatting with you. Oh it's been just a delight.
Thank you to connect with Tests. You can find her
on Instagram at test big Land And I just want
to thank you Test. It's been great talking to you.
I also want to thank Alicia Haywit are fantastic producer
and everybody listening. Thanks so much, we'll see you next time.
Road to Somewhere News
Hosts And Creators
Lisa Oz
Jill Herzig
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