ConfusionIncarnate said:
For the past several years of my life I've had this constant struggle. as each year passes I have more responsibilities. more stressful stuff. more things I choices to make. and I know I'm expected to rise to the challenge, get on with things etc.
But every time I think about the future, and all the new jobs and things I'll have to do, I just want to run away with my tail between my legs. I'm drawn to old things, memories of the past. life seemed so uncomplicated and stress-free back then.
Right now the main questions that I'm pondering is:
is this normal?, is it bad to want a simple life?
I hear you. I regularly time-travel back into my childhood memories and vacation there. No, I'm not talking about my toddlerhood memories of being in diapers (although I am blessed to have a few of those). I'm talking about the wide-open spaces of my (slightly) later years: The summer vacations, the playing with my friends in my old neighborhood, the sleepovers, the goofing off, the thinking only of what I
wanted to do and not of what I
had to do, ...
Time is funny. You can stretch it and squash it and do all sorts of things to it--in your head, anyway. I'm 41 years old, and most of my favorite childhood memories are from (cue tympani phrase from "Also Sprach Zarathustra") more than a
quarter century ago!!! That can seem like quite a while, especially when I look at a baby picture of my nearly-teenage daughter. It's not a picture of the daughter I now know. I haven't had to relate to that baby version of her for nearly 13 years. Suddenly those 13 years seem very long, and my own childhood much more distant. Without that frame of reference, however--if I focus only on my own personal experiences--I can convince myself that the me I was when I graduated from college and the me I am right now are not so very different. Not much has happened. I just grew up, and then... this. Suddenly, my entire adulthood collapses in on itself while those growing-up years spread out into an eternity. Just how does that work?! (I wonder if Stephen Hawking has it figured out?)
I guess I'm easily amused.
And I digress. Majorly.
Responsibility is not all bad. Eventually, it's the only thing that can sustain the goofing off and all the other want-to-dos. Those ends justify at least
some means, don't they? A healthy set of priorities is key, though. It took me most of 17 years and a high-stress career to find mine. It was a classic case of "boiling frog syndrome." Basically, I took what had been a hobby in childhood, earned a degree in it, got a job doing it, and then let that job slowly enslave me. The money was good, but my zest for life was depleted to the point where the money brought no pleasure. My hobbies all starved, and I found myself with little more than the threat of bills to get me out the door in the morning. Fortunately, I did eventually recognize that something was messed up, and I resolved to fix it. A couple of years ago, with my wife's help, I ratcheted things down quite a few notches, and am now working a job that manages to pay the bills, be a little fun, and also leave room for a life. It's not
perfect, but it's a ginormous improvement. It'll definitely do for now.
Life is kind of like a playground. The end result is (hopefully) fun, but some assembly is required first.
Or you can just pitch a tent among the brambles and call 'er good.
Actually, forget that second option.