The quarter-life crisis is a well-defined set of stages—Trapped, Checking Out, Separation, Exploration, Rebuilding—one goes through in breaking free from feelings of meaninglessness, lack of fulfillment, and misalignment with purpose.
I detail the stages and interweave my story below.If you’re in the trenches of this crisis, read on.I’m high in the Andes somewhere in Ecuador.
Everything has a yellow tint to it—the mountains, vegetation, even the Andean animals.It’s foggy, rainy, and fucking frigid.
I’m drenched, freezing my ass off, and have fallen in the mud multiple times—and I’m having the time of my life.It was December of 2021, and I’d never had this much fun or felt this free—certainly not in my five years of helping a large oil and gas company generate profits.Back at the hostel, warm and surrounded by people and mountain dogs, the most common question was—”how long you in Ecuador for?”Seemingly everyone responded with something like “ah, I’m traveling this entire continent, I’ve been at it for nine months.” Six months here, four there, another guy doing a year.It was my turn to answer.“Uh, five… days.”I was cramming everything Ecuador had to offer into one week before I had to be back to my job in the US.