For most of my career (or rather, careers) prior to my becoming nomadic in 2010, I had always been taking jobs and working with the quiet, retained knowledge that I would not be working that job for long. The job was always a stepping stone, always designed to get me somewhere else. The term for this, as Matt writes about, is the 'anti-sabbatical':
From Generation X by Douglas Coupland:
"Anti-sabbatical: a job taken with the sole intention of staying only for a limited period of time (often one year). The intention is usually to raise enough funds to partake in another, more personally meaningful activity such as watercolor sketching in Crete or designing computer knit sweaters in Hong Kong. Employers are rarely informed of intentions. (p.35)"
What job isn’t an anti-sabbatical, I ask you?
Well, that’s my problem, at least. Every job I take slowly turns into an anti-sabbatical even if I start with seemingly bottomless excitement and enthusiasm. Friends bet on the number of months before I say I’m ready for a new job.
The other problem I have is that I always tell my employer that I’m thinking of watercolor sketching in Crete, or moving to a Zen Monastery, or walking the Appalachian Trail or whatever. That, as you are surely saying at this moment, makes people worry about your career longevity.
Ironically, I'll be hiking the Appalachian Trail next year (more on that later).