Resolve

As I head into 2006, I get alot of advice about "leading your own life", particularly in light of my mom's passing last March. I understand the advice and I appreciate it; people think that I was living mostly for my mom (as with any relationship, things were much more complex than that simple analysis would allow) and denying myself certain things. The advice givers certainly mean well and I realize they are simply trying to get me to look forward and concentrate on the reality of the here and now. They are trying to tell me to do what I have to do to be happy.

I guess the only response I have to that sentiment is to say "thank you for caring" and add (silently of course) that "living your own life" does not, for me, at least, denote being self-absorbed or making life decisions in a vacuum. I applaud and admire those brave souls everywhere for whom following your dreams has meant casting off all or most old relationships and being single minded in pursuit of whatever encapsulates that dream; a career, a romance, a philsophical calling. Bravo.

I'm not sure it's always that easy; certainly it hasn't been for me. Part of being "who I am" means a desire to have some sense of security, to be around those who care about you and can be counted on to be there for you in hard times. I'm not trying to say that following a dream and having people who care about you are mutually exclusive propositions, but in my specific case there have been a wide variety of factors that led to the decisions I made (and didn't make) and some of them involved other people and some of them were purely selfish i.e. fear, insecurity, etc.

What I'm trying to say is that we all do what we have to do to stay sane at every particular moment of our life and most people really aren't looking very far beyond their comfort for the next few moments, if you really dig down into their motivations. That's human nature; it's often something we have to fight against, but it's something we need to acknowledge and be aware of. When we feel that the risk is doable, that is, when we feel secure and whole enough within ourselves to withstand whatever negative consequences the risk may incur, then we go ahead and take the risk and hope it's worth it. Risk is necessary and for the most part, good for us. It's just that we all arrive at the point of feeling confident about risk taking at different times, at our own pace. And it's all relative too; what may seem like a huge risk to me might seem like little or no risk to someone else.

As controlled and as cautious as my life no doubt seems to outsiders, I am taking risks. Like the movement of the clouds, they may be small and barely perceptible, but they are occurring. And (to continue to metaphor) just as a good wind increases the clouds speeds, so too have different factors increased the speed of my risks. The counsel and care of friends, the confidence which comes with more experience taking risks, and just the general feeling that I've remained fearful and static long enough have all helped push my "clouds" a bit faster.

My life is a long way from being what I want or need it to be. But...there's movement. And I hope to continue moving. I don't expect to "remake" myself, and to be quite honest, don't want to. There is at least a little "baby" with all this bathwater. But I do need to try and redefine who I am and what I'm doing on this little ball of dirt, and little by little, inch by inch, I am asking the hard questions and doing the things that often make me want to curl up and hide in a corner.

I want to post more here next year. Wish me luck.