Clearing the Way

Sometimes the hard part is figuring out what you want out of life. My parents always said to me, "You can be anything you want to be in life." I'm sure a lot of parents say that to their children. But while they are telling you that, they are also secretly telling you that what you want is this: to graduate from high school and go to college; to graduate college and get a good career for yourself making good money; to find a husband who also has a good job; to buy a nice house and collect nice things; and then to have babies so your family is complete.

And it's not just parents that are hoping your path is like this. It's pretty much the whole world and every advertisement and most things tv and magazines and even books try to shove down our throat. It's a form of brain washing that we barely realize is there until it's so deeply ingrained in our existence and our psyche that there's no possible way to escape. House+Job+Family = Happiness. Right???

I was almost 30 years old before I realized that wasn't true. It wasn't even close to true. No, I didn't have the babies part yet, but no one could ever convince me that adding a baby to the fucked up thing that was my marriage would have suddenly made me happy. And even if it had made for a happy year or two, what comes after babies in the formula? Just a lifetime of working the same job and living the same life until you die? No thanks.

In my 30's, I'm finally coming to terms with the fact that having those 'things' doesn't equal happiness. It is more of a trap, and it's harder to get out of than prison sometimes. The problem is, no one ever really taught us how to figure out what we truly want deep down in our gut. Strip away the fact that we all want money and we all want love, what else is there? It took me a long time to figure out that what I want is two-fold:

1. I want to make a difference in the world. I want to make an impact. Yes, teaching was doing that for me, but on a smaller scale that what I think I am capable of achieving. I think I can make a larger difference by writing novels. Maybe I'm not good enough yet, but someday I'm going to get published and I am going to write something great that makes a difference in people's lives.

2. I want to learn to truly love myself. I want to wake up in the morning and be proud of myself, and I want to go to bed at night knowing that I accomplished my goals for the day and worked hard. I want to be able to look in the mirror and love what I see.

Combine those two things with the love I have found with G, and I know that I will have my own home-built recipe for happiness. Not that I will be happy every second of every day, but just that my life will mean more and be more than it ever has been before.

So, now that I've figured out the first tough part: what I want out of life. There's more. The next part is figuring out how the hell to get what you want. For me, it's all about getting out of my own way and clearing the path and the rubble of my wrecked past in order to get where I want to go. One step at a time.