I’ve been kind of musing on this topic in my head for the last couple of weeks, so it seemed only fair to finally let some of it out here on digital paper in a more fluid form. I’m about to turn 35 in a couple of months, and my kid is already a year old and starting to walk, and I kind of feel like I’m coming to a crossroads of sorts in my life that I’m not entirely sure what to make of just yet.
…so this is me trying to figure that out… 😉
So anyways, what do I want out of life???
I want to live a life in which I feel generally happy … one where stress is a minor influence rather than a dominating force … one where I can look back at a given period of time and feel good about the work/life balance that exists and how I’ve been able to spend my time doing the things that I like to do as compared with the things that I have to do.
I want creativity to be a driving force in my days … where I spend a significant part of my time creating things that other people enjoy and get something positive out of … something that can build over several decades to a career catalog that I can look back at and be proud of the things that I’ve made … and I’d like to derive the wealth that I need throughout my life from this body of creative work.
I want family time to be a regular part of my everyday … not something that I have to sacrifice to attain the other goals that I’ve set for myself … and not something that I feel guilty about indulging in because there was work to be done instead … and certainly not something that I look back at much later in life, regretting how much I sacrificed it for anything else.
I want my home to be a place of sanctuary … where I can relax at the end of a long day with my feet up and a tropical drink in my hand … where child and beast can roam (relatively) free until every last drop of energy has been thoroughly spent … where I can look up at the stars or out at the water or nature or whatever and find myself surrounded by something that’s infinitely more peaceful than more houses within a stone’s throw away.
I want to travel … to places around town that we’ve never been … and across the country … and across the world … to see strange and amazing things that we’ve only read in books … and to rekindle time with family that is often lost when living on far corners of the nation.
I want to have free time … to revisit old habits like playing the guitar and SCUBA diving and reading … and to explore new ones like hiking and boating and actually being physically fit … and occasionally I want to be able to stay up all night playing video games and eating pizza, too.
I want to enjoy every month of every year for what it offers … and I want less of that “Where does the time go?” feeling that seems to rear its head more and more.
I want more good days than less than good days … as defined by feeling good about the various situations and decisions and facets that make up each one of them at the end of the day.
I want a lot of things out of life. Some would probably say that I’m being greedy and should learn to just love life as it’s been dealt to me, but that’s not good enough for me. I think that too many people in our world settle for things just being the way they are instead of pushing those seemingly immovable forces in their lives to do better, whereas if I look back throughout history it was the people who did the impossible things that inspire me to strive for more.
I read a great quote the other day that went something like – “Don’t be afraid to dream bigger – nobody else is going to do it for you.”
Of course, dreaming is only half the equation – the other half of the challenge lies in actually following your dreams to go out and make them a reality. And I guess you could say that’s the crossroads where I find myself at today, which is weird because I feel like I’ve already been on this road for a long time, but at the same time I’d hate to change course now when the good stuff could be right around the next bend. Still, I can’t help but wondering at this juncture just how long the road goes, or at the very least just how long this particular metaphor goes…
Just keep on truckin’?
Sure, I think we can go ahead and end it there for now… 😛