I have a confession to make: I don’t like pumpkin spice anything.
Are you shocked?
If you know me well, probably not. You’re aware I’m a bit peculiar at times.
Here are a few more of my peculiarities:
- I favor obscure authors and unusual time periods. (Ancient Rome, anyone?)
- I choose not to shop at certain local stores that everyone else loves (as a matter of preference, not morals).
- I rarely follow recipes.
- I prefer Shakespeare plays to Broadway musicals.
Why am I telling you this?
To show that I often find myself choosing to go against the flow rather than put up with the more conventional choice.
I’ve coined a term for myself: I’m quietly unconventional.
A Quietly unconventional childhood
I have always been like this, preferring to live life just a little outside the mainstream. Even as a child I sometimes chose not to do what everyone else was doing. For example, I never put milk in my cereal. I ate it dry. I was fully aware that “normal” people liked milk with their cereal, but I preferred mine to remain crunchy. Still do.
Another silly childhood example involves books. There were certain series that I decided I didn’t want to read simply because everyone else wanted to read them.
At this point, some of you are nodding your head in understanding. My quietly unconventional choices resonate with you, because you’ve made similar decisions to be a little bit different. Others of you are shaking your heads in bewilderment. It would never have crossed your minds to do avoid something solely because it was popular.
That’s OK.
However, this post is written primarily for those of you who like the idea of being quietly unconventional.
Are you quietly unconventional?
We quietly unconventional types aren’t trying to convince everyone to think like we do. Nor do we make non-conformist choices in the hopes that others will notice how we refuse to conform. I am henceforth calling people like that loudly unconventional.
Our world needs people to be loudly unconventional, activists, rebels, and visionaries who make it their life work to change the world. Being loud isn’t my calling, however, and it’s not who I’m writing to.
We quietly unconventional folks don’t want to draw attention to ourselves, but we refuse to live a cookie cutter lifestyle. When push comes to shove, we choose to act according to our values and boundaries, even when that means acting contrary to the accepted norms of our upbringing, family, neighborhood, peers, or society in general.
We change our world, too, but we do it slowly and subtly, one small choice, action, or conversation at a time. Everyday, in a myriad of small ways, we are enacting teeny rebellions against the mainstream, in order to live with as much authenticity as possible.
A quietly unconventional lifestyle takes intention
Quietly unconventional is part of the core of who I am and what I care passionately about. It’s also one of the foundations of what I blog about at Live Intentionally because it takes effort and intention to forge your own path instead of drifting with the mainstream flow.
In the weeks that follow I’ll be exploring more about the challenges, frustrations, and potential risks of living a quietly unconventional life, as well as the joy, freedom, and growth that come when make are able to accept who we are and show our true selves to the world.
One quietly unconventional step at a time.
