The other day, I was sitting at my computer waiting for a program to finish patching, feeling kind of sour. For a few months now, I’ve been feeling kind of down off and on as I examine my life and where I am. Now, I am not saying I have a bad life; on the contrary, things are the best they’ve been since high school. It’s just that I am in no way where I intended to be at this point in my life. But hey, who ever is?
As I watched the progress bar on the patch tick upwards little by little, I heard my dog, Baxter, who was lying on the floor behind me, twitching in his sleep as he often does. I swiveled my chair around and looked down at him, thinking that sometimes it might be easier to be a dog. I started trying to visualize the world from Baxter’s point of view. He has no responsibilities or expectations to live up to. At 12 years old, all he has to worry about doing is eating, sleeping and relieving himself. But would that really be a better alternative? For that matter, is he actually happy with his life? Do dogs even worry about such things, like we do?
We humans seek fulfillment in our lives and we also tend to want acknowledgement of it from others. Like many others, I don’t tend to feel fulfilled. As I said, my life is the best it has been in over a decade, but I still feel like I’m missing things from my life, or, more aptly, missing life itself. I’ve never been a particularly social creature, and I’ve yet to date anyone or even go on a real date for that matter. As I previously noted, I certainly have taken a far different path from the one I had planned; by this time, I had intended to be a music teacher with a wife and maybe a couple of kids. Obviously, it’s almost unheard of for someone to follow the path they set their sophomore year of high school as things change and unpredictable things always crop up; it comes down to the fact that we go down a path for a reason, whether or not we chose it.
While I watched Baxter sleeping and dreaming (no doubt about chasing a rabbit or something) I pondered all of this in my mind as I realized that dogs, unlike humans, don’t have to worry about what path to choose; their path, at least those who have a home, is chosen for them. They don’t have to worry about the future. But that’s not really living. That’s just subsiding. That’s what I feel my life is anymore, just subsiding. Much of this is my own fault, being that like most Americans, I lead a far too sedentary lifestyle. I have almost obscene amounts of ambition but I never motivate myself to do anything, partially because I tend to be too busy feeling sorry for myself; however, in my defense, I’ve been through a lot in the last decade or so and it has taken a long time to rebuild myself and there’s still a long way to go. Some of this also comes from the fact that, as an Aquarian, I am a very introverted person who has a natural lack of confidence.
Now, I’m not just trying to rationalize why my life isn’t what I want it to be; frankly, I gladly admit that about 99% of the blame lies on me. My life took an entirely different course from what I had planned as a direct result of my actions, and I’d be willing to bet money that the same is true for everyone. My problem is that I don’t really know how to live. Most people learn this in their early to mid twenties while they are in college or working. When I got out of high school, I was immediately overwhelmed with responsibilities; simply put, I didn’t have the ability to live. There was so much else to do that all I could focus on was merely subsiding. Most of those responsibilities have long since been lifted, but I still don’t know how to do anything else but subside. To make matters worse, I’m stuck in a comfort zone I’m afraid to leave. But while this all sucks, I also know that this is the path I was meant to take.
As the program patch neared completion, I continued thinking about Baxter’s life and his viewpoint. A few paragraphs up, I posed a question about whether or not he is happy. Being that he cannot speak, there is no way to definitively answer this; however, if I had to wager a guess, I would say that he is not happy. I think that, like most humans, he is simply content. He would love to go for more walks and have more playtime (unfortunately, the latter is largely prevented by injuries to his left hind leg and pelvis from getting hit by a car a few years ago) but he generally just hangs around the house due to my busy school schedule.
I realized then and there that that may be the biggest problem with my life, that I am just content. This is a problem that I think most people in this day and age have to some degree; we are so caught up in the hustle and bustle of everyday life that we just subside. We have so many devices to make life easier for us that we don’t really live and, admittedly, as a geek, I use many of them. However, we are now becoming too complacent, too willing to just let things happen. Life just passes by. That’s exactly what seems to be happening in my own life right now. In the past few years, I’ve lived more than I have in my entire life, but I still feel like I’m being far too complacent. Life is still passing me by, and I have missed and am missing so much.
It is at this juncture that I have been stuck for a very long time. I am well aware of my capabilities and know that if I really want things to change, I can do it. However, while not a believer in fate per se, I do firmly believe that everything happens for a reason (although in most instances, we are not meant to understand the reasoning behind things and I have learned through experience that trying to force an understanding will only end badly) and so I do my best to accept that the guy upstairs knows what he’s doing. In a nutshell, my spiritual beliefs and my intuition keep clashing on these big decisions, rendering me unable to move. The problem is that they are both right.
Regardless of my internal tug of war, I have already proved, at least to myself, what I am capable of. I have had to make life-altering decisions within minutes. I have had all power over my life stripped from me and have come out a stronger and better man for it. I’ve seen how dark and cruel this world can be, but I’ve also seen how bright and wonderful it can be; no doubt my preference of being an observer instead of a participator (again, a facet of my Aquarian nature) is also leading me to miss a great many things.
The program finally finished patching and Baxter woke up at about the same time, looking around groggily. In hindsight, this is an interesting bit of symbolism, as our eyes can see without our brain processing. Sometimes the guy upstairs or fate or whatever you want to call it forces us to open our eyes with a kick in our complacency, usually in the form of something quite painful. But our eyes open so fast that our brain needs time to catch up, meaning we’re bound to act like a complete idiot while our brain is trying to catch up with what we’ve seen. However, just to make it even worse, we have a subconscious awareness of exactly what we’ve seen and what it means. We just choose to ignore it, a costly mistake I’ve made way too many times.
It’s an incredibly difficult path at times, with forks in the road here and there that require impossible decisions that damn you either way. I’ve always felt that the best thing to do is to just take life a day at a time. I may feel lonely and I may feel empty, but I also have few regrets in spite of everything I’ve done and everything I’ve been through because you can’t change the past. You also can’t predict the future because it’s not set in stone (though I’ve sure as hell tried), but you also can’t just resign yourself to fate because our destinies, our lives, they aren’t preordained either. We make such choices every day, but we don’t often realize it. I made a choice that day: when my program was ready, I chose the latter so that I could have a well earned day of rest playing “The Sims 3” because, ironically, I can run someone else’s life better than my own.
As I watched the progress bar on the patch tick upwards little by little, I heard my dog, Baxter, who was lying on the floor behind me, twitching in his sleep as he often does. I swiveled my chair around and looked down at him, thinking that sometimes it might be easier to be a dog. I started trying to visualize the world from Baxter’s point of view. He has no responsibilities or expectations to live up to. At 12 years old, all he has to worry about doing is eating, sleeping and relieving himself. But would that really be a better alternative? For that matter, is he actually happy with his life? Do dogs even worry about such things, like we do?
We humans seek fulfillment in our lives and we also tend to want acknowledgement of it from others. Like many others, I don’t tend to feel fulfilled. As I said, my life is the best it has been in over a decade, but I still feel like I’m missing things from my life, or, more aptly, missing life itself. I’ve never been a particularly social creature, and I’ve yet to date anyone or even go on a real date for that matter. As I previously noted, I certainly have taken a far different path from the one I had planned; by this time, I had intended to be a music teacher with a wife and maybe a couple of kids. Obviously, it’s almost unheard of for someone to follow the path they set their sophomore year of high school as things change and unpredictable things always crop up; it comes down to the fact that we go down a path for a reason, whether or not we chose it.
While I watched Baxter sleeping and dreaming (no doubt about chasing a rabbit or something) I pondered all of this in my mind as I realized that dogs, unlike humans, don’t have to worry about what path to choose; their path, at least those who have a home, is chosen for them. They don’t have to worry about the future. But that’s not really living. That’s just subsiding. That’s what I feel my life is anymore, just subsiding. Much of this is my own fault, being that like most Americans, I lead a far too sedentary lifestyle. I have almost obscene amounts of ambition but I never motivate myself to do anything, partially because I tend to be too busy feeling sorry for myself; however, in my defense, I’ve been through a lot in the last decade or so and it has taken a long time to rebuild myself and there’s still a long way to go. Some of this also comes from the fact that, as an Aquarian, I am a very introverted person who has a natural lack of confidence.
Now, I’m not just trying to rationalize why my life isn’t what I want it to be; frankly, I gladly admit that about 99% of the blame lies on me. My life took an entirely different course from what I had planned as a direct result of my actions, and I’d be willing to bet money that the same is true for everyone. My problem is that I don’t really know how to live. Most people learn this in their early to mid twenties while they are in college or working. When I got out of high school, I was immediately overwhelmed with responsibilities; simply put, I didn’t have the ability to live. There was so much else to do that all I could focus on was merely subsiding. Most of those responsibilities have long since been lifted, but I still don’t know how to do anything else but subside. To make matters worse, I’m stuck in a comfort zone I’m afraid to leave. But while this all sucks, I also know that this is the path I was meant to take.
As the program patch neared completion, I continued thinking about Baxter’s life and his viewpoint. A few paragraphs up, I posed a question about whether or not he is happy. Being that he cannot speak, there is no way to definitively answer this; however, if I had to wager a guess, I would say that he is not happy. I think that, like most humans, he is simply content. He would love to go for more walks and have more playtime (unfortunately, the latter is largely prevented by injuries to his left hind leg and pelvis from getting hit by a car a few years ago) but he generally just hangs around the house due to my busy school schedule.
I realized then and there that that may be the biggest problem with my life, that I am just content. This is a problem that I think most people in this day and age have to some degree; we are so caught up in the hustle and bustle of everyday life that we just subside. We have so many devices to make life easier for us that we don’t really live and, admittedly, as a geek, I use many of them. However, we are now becoming too complacent, too willing to just let things happen. Life just passes by. That’s exactly what seems to be happening in my own life right now. In the past few years, I’ve lived more than I have in my entire life, but I still feel like I’m being far too complacent. Life is still passing me by, and I have missed and am missing so much.
It is at this juncture that I have been stuck for a very long time. I am well aware of my capabilities and know that if I really want things to change, I can do it. However, while not a believer in fate per se, I do firmly believe that everything happens for a reason (although in most instances, we are not meant to understand the reasoning behind things and I have learned through experience that trying to force an understanding will only end badly) and so I do my best to accept that the guy upstairs knows what he’s doing. In a nutshell, my spiritual beliefs and my intuition keep clashing on these big decisions, rendering me unable to move. The problem is that they are both right.
Regardless of my internal tug of war, I have already proved, at least to myself, what I am capable of. I have had to make life-altering decisions within minutes. I have had all power over my life stripped from me and have come out a stronger and better man for it. I’ve seen how dark and cruel this world can be, but I’ve also seen how bright and wonderful it can be; no doubt my preference of being an observer instead of a participator (again, a facet of my Aquarian nature) is also leading me to miss a great many things.
The program finally finished patching and Baxter woke up at about the same time, looking around groggily. In hindsight, this is an interesting bit of symbolism, as our eyes can see without our brain processing. Sometimes the guy upstairs or fate or whatever you want to call it forces us to open our eyes with a kick in our complacency, usually in the form of something quite painful. But our eyes open so fast that our brain needs time to catch up, meaning we’re bound to act like a complete idiot while our brain is trying to catch up with what we’ve seen. However, just to make it even worse, we have a subconscious awareness of exactly what we’ve seen and what it means. We just choose to ignore it, a costly mistake I’ve made way too many times.
It’s an incredibly difficult path at times, with forks in the road here and there that require impossible decisions that damn you either way. I’ve always felt that the best thing to do is to just take life a day at a time. I may feel lonely and I may feel empty, but I also have few regrets in spite of everything I’ve done and everything I’ve been through because you can’t change the past. You also can’t predict the future because it’s not set in stone (though I’ve sure as hell tried), but you also can’t just resign yourself to fate because our destinies, our lives, they aren’t preordained either. We make such choices every day, but we don’t often realize it. I made a choice that day: when my program was ready, I chose the latter so that I could have a well earned day of rest playing “The Sims 3” because, ironically, I can run someone else’s life better than my own.
