We Called It Temporary. It Lasted 21 Years.
Declaration of Intendependence™, Part 1: The Declaration
Series hub:https://no2thequo.com/declaration-of-intendependence/
Stop Living Life by Default Doesn’t Start With a Big Decision
No one wakes up one morning and decides to live life by default.
It usually happens quietly.
Politely.
One reasonable yes at a time.
You say yes because you’re capable.
Because you’re needed.
Because someone has to step in.
And then one day you look up and realize you’ve been standing in the same place for a very long time, calling it “temporary.”
What Is Intendependence™?
Intendependence is a word we made up.
Because we couldn’t find a real one that meant what we meant. (We tried. English failed us.)
It’s the kind of independence you earn by declaring an intention, taking action, and being tenacious until it’s real.
Not because you manifested it. Because you moved.
Because nothing changes until you decide, on purpose, that it has to.
Intendependence™ (in-ten-de-PEN-dence)
noun Independence earned through intention + action + tenacity.
Disclosure: As an Amazon Associate, we earn from qualifying purchases.
One book that completely changed our outlook on intention is Dr. Wayne Dyer’s The Power of Intention. This is the book we still grab when we need to reset our brain back to what we want instead of what’s trying to talk us out of it. If you want a solid book to keep on hand while you build your own Declaration of Intendependence, this is the one.
What Is “The Declaration” (In Matt & Linda Terms)?
The Declaration
noun, now a verb The moment you stop waiting and start building.
For a long time, I thought my “this isn’t it” moment happened around year fifteen.
But the truth is, my brain filed parts of that season in a cabinet marked: not right now.
After giving myself permission to remember, I realized my real breaking point came later.
It was year nineteen.
The Year Nineteen Moment
We had two couples join our community who didn’t just attend. They committed. They helped lead. They helped build. Over time, it felt like we weren’t just working alongside them, we were doing life together.
Lunch after Sunday gatherings.
Dinner on Friday nights.
Vacations.
Our kids dating each other.
If you’ve ever had that kind of closeness, you know what it feels like. You stop calling it “friendship” and start calling it “family,” even if you don’t say it out loud.
In 2013, we all went to a conference in Cabo and spent the week planning the next year’s vision. We came home, laid it out, rallied the people, and started building the plan together.
Everything looked solid.
The Phone Call That Changed Everything
Then in 2014, Linda and I finally took a real break. We went on a cruise, then booked a little “alone time” at a hotel, because at that point we weren’t just tired, we were overdue.
While we were away, we had trusted friends step in to cover things.
And that’s when the phone call came.
Our guests told us, plainly, we needed to get back.
I remember being hot angry the moment I heard it, because I could feel it happening again. Another relationship going up in flames. Another “we’re family” turning into “we’re done.”
There’s rarely any fixing those situations.
You don’t argue. You don’t negotiate.
You just never see them again.
We cut our time short and drove home with a lot of miles to think and plenty of time to stew. (Which, if you’re wondering, is not a relaxing way to end a vacation.)
A short time later, those two couples met with us and told us something I still remember clearly:
We can’t be friends anymore.
We’re leaving.
And we’re leaving your life too.
No screaming.
No dramatic exit.
Just a clean severing of something we thought was mutual.
That was my moment.
Not “I’m a little burned out.”
More like: I’m not doing this part anymore.
It wasn’t that everyone was bad. They weren’t. Many people were good. Some stayed loyal and kind for decades.
But that was the last time I was going to let my family get pulled close and then dropped like it didn’t matter.
That pain took years to heal. Not totally, but close.
And it clarified something I couldn’t unsee: I had stayed in a role for a long time that was now costing us more than it was giving.
That role, for context, happened to be pastoring a church.
One line. No explanation needed.
From that point on, it wasn’t a question of if I was leaving.
It was how.
Leaving Clean Without Burning It Down
I gave the board six months’ notice because I cared deeply for the people for whom, and with whom, I served.
I wasn’t trying to burn anything down.
I was trying to leave clean.
I stayed a little longer. I did what I knew to do with integrity.
But the direction had changed.
The Declaration had been made.
Linda’s Moment: What Really Matters Now?
Linda’s “this isn’t it” moment had its own timing, but it landed in the same place.
After years of doing everything right, we took a longer break. Long enough to stop performing and finally hear ourselves think.
And the question showed up:
We had the house.
The schedule.
The version of success that looks great from the outside.
And it still felt heavy.
So Linda wrote a list. Not goals. Priorities.
Faith.
Family.
Focus.
Freedom.
We didn’t know what the next version of life would look like. We just knew we wanted to build it on purpose, not by default.
That’s what a Declaration actually is.
Not quitting everything.
Not having all the answers.
Not blowing up your life.
A Declaration is choosing direction before you know the route.
The First Proof It Was Real
And when we finally made the travel-and-work decision for real, our first action wasn’t listing the house.
It was talking to our boys.
We sat them down and told them our plan: sell almost everything, keep the car, and travel full time.
Then we asked the question that felt both ridiculous and necessary:
Are you okay not having a childhood home to come back to?
We joked that they’d have to find us somewhere in the world if they wanted to visit.
They looked at each other, then looked back at us, and said something that still hits me in the chest:
You spent our whole lives investing in us.
It’s your turn to invest in yourselves.
Cue the tears. The good kind.
We celebrated together, and shortly after, we put the house up for sale with actual joy.
Not panic.
Not fear.
Joy.
Hell Yeah. We’re Doing This.
It’s funny, Linda and I have been saying No 2 The Quo since before we knew it was a phrase.
We met in a bar doing karaoke and eloped eight weeks later. Then we met our parents.
So when people ask, “Was there an ‘oh wow, we’re really doing this’ moment?”
Honestly, we’ve had so many, they don’t feel like “are we really doing this” moments anymore.
They feel like:
Hell yeah. We’re doing this.
That’s Intendependence.
If you want the bridge between a Declaration and an actual life change, read: It Took Two Years to “Suddenly” Change Our Lives.
Make Your Declaration
You don’t need to know the how.
You don’t need a perfect plan.
You don’t need unanimous consent.
You need to answer one question honestly:
One Question To Answer Honestly
What are you no longer willing to keep doing by default?
Write it down.
Say it out loud.
Then take one small action that proves you mean it.
That’s how the rest begins.
Thanks for coming along for the ride.
With love and laughter,
Matt & Linda
No 2 The Quo
Next up: Part 2: Private Alignment
“We Talked Until It Was Un-Talk-Out-Able”
How to get aligned internally before making a major life change.
Before We Had the Framework, We Had the Stories
We didn’t start No 2 The Quo with a tidy little life design model and a color-coded spreadsheet.
Shocking, I know.
We started with a few lived decisions. Big ones. Messy ones. The kind where you say, “This is probably fine,” while quietly wondering if you have lost your entire mind.
These three stories explain how we got here before we had the words Declaration of Intendependence™ to describe what we were doing.
These are the origin stories behind No 2 The Quo.
👉 Why We Said No 2 The Quo After the Kids Left Home
👉 It Took Two Years to “Suddenly” Change Our Lives
👉 Yes, We Really Did Pack Our Whole Life Into a Car and Leave
Ready to Start Redesigning Your Life?
Download our free guide:
“How to Start Redesigning Your Life This Week (Even If You Think It’s Too Late)”
Get the 3-step framework we used to go from burned out to full-time freedom.
No theory. No fluff. Just practical moves you can make this week.
Plus, you’ll get our weekly emails every Tuesday—Life Design strategies and adventure stories that prove freedom is possible.
No spam. No nonsense. And yes, we’ll probably talk about helmets.