Ponderosa
Monday, September 8th, 2008I was writing some sentimental crap yesterday based on thoughts and conversations over the past week or so, and then while I was walking home today in the middle of a thunderstorm (lightning, pissing rain, no umbrella) I came to a couple of realisations.
One is that everything that has happened in the past 18 months to two years has changed me irreversibly. And I have to go forward from here. Sure, I feel empty and unfulfilled a lot of the time, but when one star burns so brightly in your life, and then it becomes a distant flicker no matter how hard you look for it….well there’s nothing you can do. It’s just not coming back. That is hard to come to terms with, and I guess I haven’t, or hadn’t, but recognition is a step forward (maybe?).
The next is that the thing I am most afraid of is myself. I worry about being a “failure”, but my aspirations and success criteria (how very consultant) are self-determined. I put pressure on myself, forces that no-one sees or is aware of except me. I need to let go of my pre-conceptions. I need to free myself from myself. Once I do that, perhaps I will find the inner peace which I have, up until now, been looking for in places and things. Sometimes we have to look in instead of out. Sometimes I feel like I’m on the outside looking in. But such perspective is hard to come by, and keep in mind.
I also feel, for some reason unbeknownst to probably anyone, as it makes no sense, is that I actually feel slightly afraid of just being myself. That smacks of a deep lack of confidence, but I wouldn’t say that about myself. It’s weird where these behaviours come from. And it’s weird how we can end up being or doing the exact opposite of how we want to be.
Who am I trying to please? As long as it is not myself, truly, then how can I be content. I need to think about what I want, rather than what I think I should be doing. Though it’s also possible to think too much, when action is what’s required.
I have been thinking about how defining one’s own reality means you can pretty much live how you want. I.e. the idea that as long as you believe strongly in something, that it’s true, or the “right” way, then it is. As Tim Ferriss says, it’s not enough to simply think outside the box - we have to act outside the box too.
Options are a blessing, not a curse. Time to take positive thinking to the next level?
This is perhaps more candid than I’d usually care to publish, but whatever.
Go with the flow.
