I am very driven by structured routines. I have been my entire adult life. I thrive off a crystal clear, always reliable, set in stone routine.

For the last eight years, my routine has been some version of the following:

• Wake up early

• read while drinking coffee

• eat breakfast

• go to my teaching job

• come home

• eat dinner

• watch TV with Michael

• read in bed

• early bedtime

Over the years, this very broad routine has shifted to accommodate more time for working out, outings with friends, what exactly we’re watching on TV, more or less reading time. But for the most part, this routine has stayed the same for the last eight years of my life.

In January, I decided to leave my teaching job and have been mentally preparing for that departure since the decision was made. When school let out in June, it was time to move forward.

Every day since, I’ve found myself on a new discovery of what it’s like to live outside of my eight year routine. Some things haven’t changed at all and I don’t foresee them changing: wake up early, drink coffee, read. These are my go-to’s and how I start every single morning and I prefer it this way. But other things like what time I’m eating lunch, what time I’m closing my laptop and being “done” for the day with writing and learning, what time we’re eating dinner each night. Each time I change something that was once part of my routine, it feels like I’m carving out a piece of myself and exploring another piece in its place.

The thing about a routine is once you’ve been in one for so long, it almost feels like a relationship that you didn’t realize you could leave. “Oh, I can eat dinner at 7, stay up until 11?” or “Maybe I won’t sit down to write until 9 this morning. Wait, I can read for 2 hours first thing in the morning?”

Sometimes I find myself completely overwhelmed by the possibilities of what is to come, what could be. But most of the time, I’m taking one small part of my day, flipping it on it’s head, and observing what happens.

I think there’s discomfort to be found there, but maybe there’s growth too.