*cue music* "Right Now!"
I read a quote somewhere saying that Hell is always wanting to be somewhere different than where you are. The italicized portion below touches on this and is from a book I’ve been reading off and on over the past couple of months: Women, Food and God.
I think it hits on a majority of the issues I and other people seem to be coming across in life at the moment. Overall, I’ve noticed various others (including myself) defining their happiness on a goal that has yet to be reached whilst saying and/or thinking, “I’m just waiting until I can do this or that” or “I’ll be happy/complete/cool/a good person/finally worth something when I get to this point…”
It’s not about the goal. It’s not about Being Thin or Being Someone Special or Getting There. Those are fantasies in your mind – - and they are all in the future, a future that never comes. Because when your goals are reached, they will be reached in the “right now.” And in the “right now,” you will still be you, doing the same things you do now. You will still stand up. Walk around….Sleep. [You will still] Feel happy. Feel devastated. Feel lonely. Feel loved. Get old. Die…
Can you accept [your choices]? …As the willingness to stop defining your tasks as a means to an end and instead inhabit what you yourself have chosen. What if this is exactly what you are supposed to be doing because it is what you are doing?…
When you you miss those moments because you’d rather be doing something else, you are missing your own life. Those moments are gone. You will never get them back.
"Live in the now!"
You know, I used to go around saying and thinking, “I was meant for so much more. I can do better. I will be better. Just wait. Good and big things are coming for me. Just wait.”
Wait. Wait, wait wait wait! In the meantime, I’ve lost all of those moments in between the starting point and Missy the Great. While I think it IS great and necessary for you to strive for more in life and to have goals, I don’t think you should wait to accept the present and be happy right now.
I understand life isn’t about walking out the door with a huge grin on your face regardless of circumstance. Because, as we all know, certain events or circumstances really REALLY suck. Or just kinda suck. Or we’re just unhappy or not pleased with the outcome. Sometimes, we’re just not in a good mood for no reason at all.
I don’t think you have to have a reason to be pissy or unhappy or pleased or overjoyed. Sometimes, you just feel whatever and it is what it is. You’re still you. And you still have power over your mind. And your life. And your choice to be happy… umm…right…aboooout….NOW.
Nevertheless, I’m writing this more for personal mental permanence rather than as a sermon. Believe me, this is something I fight with on a daily, if not (okay, definitely) a second-by-second basis. I can’t be one to judge and preach to others on what they think and feel because I’m a prime example of “Future Dwelling.” I’m an escape artist.
I guess the “artist” part of it is that I don’t know when that time will be or the destination of my escape. (The art is the mystery, right? Ha! Riiiiight.) Unlike Doc and Marty, I can’t travel through time.
I would, however, settle for a DeLorean. Who’s riding with me?
