Packing Light Challenge: Days 7-10

This is one of those challenges that I'm determined to see through and although I haven't been able to follow through with blogging daily, I have been reading the daily prompts and doing some serious thinking about 2015.  So, here is the remainder of the Packing Light Challenge and the start of my plan to fulfill my European dream.
On Day 7, the question was to accomplish your dream from Day 1 what do you need that you don't have?  Well, that's easy...I NEED A JOB IN EUROPE!  The interesting thing is that this very week I was talking with another colleague who has a similar dream to mine and and happens to be working on hers this year and now I have a bit more information about how to go about finding this job.  I think I now know which job fairs I may be considering for next year--Bangkok and London, both will take place in January 2015 and could be the ticket to the job I am hoping for.  Looking forward, this is seeming more and more possible but as I think and plan I feel a knot in my stomach--not the painful, horrible kind but the one that indicates excited anticipation.  Could this dream become a reality?

Day 8 has already been accomplished...tell someone.  I've already detailed my plan, my needs, and my fears with my parents and a few friends.  Overall, everyone who has heard tells me the same thing--now is the time.  Which brings us to Day 9 and a hard challenge: Quit something.  This is where the lump in my throat forms.  I've quit putting off this dream by starting this challenge.  I've quit letting myself be talked out of this idea because I "might" be lonely or it "might" be difficult or I "might not" find the right job.  But there is something else I think I might like to quit as I prepare to do the work necessary to follow this dream.  For the last year I've struggled through the role of yearbook advisor.  Working with the students has been great.  Managing high school students who are over-committed as they produce a 300-page high quality publication is challenging and frustrating but the kids are the highlight.  What has not been great is that we (my co-advisor and myself) are running this program as a club.  Yes, that means there is no class time to produce this yearbook.  We do it in our "free time" and last year was what I would call a nightmare.  Last year we should have quit because we were treated so badly by another colleague that we were essentially being bullied.  And just when we thought it couldn't get any worse, we had the rug pulled out from under us and additional work added.  So, this year may be the last year unless the structure of the program changes.  I realized something important during my Chuseok stay-cation.  I really love being creative and making crafty projects.  I love scrapbooking and paper crafting but I just don't seem to have much time for this hobby because I spend an unholy number of hours working.  This is year 9 in the classroom for me and I work pretty darn hard at school but I still can't get it all done there so that means I'm working almost every night and every weekend to stay caught up.  This prompt urges us to quit something to free up time to pursue our dream from Day 1.  If I'm going to have time to build my resume, create a web based portfolio, and be my creative self something has to go.  Hmmm??

Today is Day 10: Steps and Leaps.  As I've decided to sign on for one more year at Seoul Foreign School I definitely will not be making my dream a reality until 2015 but that gives me the time to make a comprehensive list of things I need to do to prepare to look for a new job, and things I want to do while I still live in Korea and in Asia.  I've already started thinking about the places I want to travel while in Asia and I'm working on my Korea To-Do list, perhaps a post coming soon.  While it's scary to think about a massive change, it is also exciting to imagine the best possible scenario.  What if I really do get that dream job?  Wouldn't that be amazing?  Someone once told me that they've noticed I've been able to meet every goal I've ever set for myself because I took the time to make  a plan and had the perseverance to see it through.  Perhaps I should see this European adventure as a goal, rather than a dream.  I know what I need to do to get there, it's just a matter of doing the work needed (plus a little faith, prayer, and luck) to get me where I want to go.  Just this morning I was reading The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch and he wrote that brick walls were just meant to keep people out who weren't willing to try hard enough.  At this point, I've not even begun to try to reach my dream so who knows what will happen once I have!