Security (part 5)
What do you do when you realize that maybe you aren’t cut out for your dream? It’s the only thing you ever thought you were going to do with your life, and only now you’re coming to realize that you don’t really like it? Work is work is work, but this work isn’t particularly gratifying, nor is it really that important, and that makes it difficult to get done. But you’ve already spent your whole life preparing for it. You feel so incredibly lost. It’s like having a roadmap for a country, that you find out, has never existed. And you feel like, “What am I doing here? How did I even get to this point?” The feeling crushes you. “I’m not supposed to be here,” is another one.
Where am I supposed to be? Why does it seem like everyone else knows exactly where they’re supposed to be, but not me? Why do I feel that no matter what I’m doing, I’m wasting my time? Why do I have to want something ‘better’ than a simple job at a simple store, where I work my hours and then go home and enjoy my free time with the people I love? Why did everyone tell me I have to change the world when I was growing up?
I’m tired. I want to sit down beside the love of my life and read a book, or write a poem. I want to make tea for her and when we’re done our little break, I want to go back outside and finish my work. I want to keep what’s most important close to me and keep what’s close to me the most important. I’m tired of worrying about bombings on the other side of the world, horrible as they are. I don’t want to write abstract papers about a subject I don’t care about. I want to throw a plastic straw into the trash without feeling guilty, just one time. Let the mega-corporations save the earth; they’re the ones who broke it. I want to just worry about myself for a while.
Did I eat well today? Did I drink enough water? Am I sleeping enough? What time am I going to the gym today? When’s the last time I caught up with an old friend? Am I working on the things I have the power to change? Am I keeping my dispositions in check? Am I looking with wonder, or with disdain? Can my family and friends see the love in my heart?
Maybe I’m not cut out to do the things I always thought I would. But maybe neither am I completely lost. I’m going slow, and I’m slowly learning. I think (I hope) maybe everyone is given a map to a country that doesn’t exist, and only later in life do they learn to throw that map out the window. It’s about time that I do the same.