Crossroads

     I've hit a crossroads. I guess this is as good of a topic as any to start a blog on, and what has prompted me to finally start my own blog in the first place, which is long overdue. I used to write, back in the day when myspace.com was still a relevant thing and dinosaurs ruled the earth. I also was an opinion columnist for my University newspaper, The Daily Mississippian (www.thedmonline.com). However all that seems like a lifetime ago, and in a sense it was. After all, the most recent serious writing I did was back in 2007, and I feel like I have let this go for far too long. It's an easy thing to let happen. Life gets in the way, our dreams fade, and in my case I feel like I have sort of forgotten who I was and who I wanted to be. Like many people, I got caught up in the "rat race" of survival, becoming more and more concerned with making money and doing all the things my family, friends, and moreover society expected me to do and forgetting all about my dreams and who I wanted to be. In trying to survive, I forgot how to live.

     I know I am not alone in this, I see it all the time. People go about a mundane existence, unhappy and unfulfilled, having long ago given up on their dreams, seeing them as unobtainable. I've seen it in my own father, my other relatives, and my friends. I see it in the random stranger working at the convenience store. It's merely an observation, but I see far too many people who have seem to have simply just given up. They don't believe their dreams are obtainable, or that there are too many challenges in the way. To be fair, the societal and economic climate isn't exactly conducive to following one's dreams either, and seems to prefer and find a way to turn people into just another cog in the machine. It's not until we start hitting middle age that some people realize that they messed up. This of course leads to a lot of unhealthy behavior trying to make up for lost time in ineffectual ways such as buying a fancy fast car, cheating on their spouse, and other risky behavior. 

      It's a bit of a long-winded introduction, but that's part of what lead me here. I'm going to be 38 this year, that's just two years shy of middle-aged. It came quickly, to put it mildly. It seems like just yesterday I was 25 and out partying with friends, my whole life ahead of me. I erroneously expected things to just fall into place, not realizing the level of effort involved to make my dreams and goals a reality. Needless to say I'm nowhere near where I expected to be at an age when I'm staring middle age in the face. I've spent the last decade and more worrying about the same thing everyone else gets hung up on, the rat race of survival. I did what my family and society expected me to do, getting a mundane job that quite honestly was painfully tedious and unfulfilling that I hated. Sure, I made money, but I was and am also miserable in doing so. It wasn't until I stopped working for my most recent employer that I really started to ask myself "what the hell am I doing with my life?" I realized that life was slipping away, thankfully before it was "too late."

     Money seems like a stupid thing to spend a bunch of time worrying about, but it's an inescapable monkey on our backs that we're forced to deal with. The reality is, everything costs money. Food, water, travel, and everything in between has a financial component. Nothing can happen without money. It's a pretty depressing situation, however reasonable in that money is resources and in a sense energy needed to make things happen. Unfortunately it also has a way of consuming us to the point to where money becomes all that life is about. Not our goals, dreams and aspirations, but making more money so we can pay the bills, eat, and if were lucky put a little bit away in to our bank accounts. We spend it on trinkets that we think will make us happy, or drugs, or trips, or cars, etc instead of using it to follow our goals that we had at one time, but forgot about or gave up on. Only a  few of us are smart and/or lucky enough to escape this vicious cycle. 

     This is what lead me here, the purpose of this blog. It's an attempt to recapture dreams of yesterday, and to pursue them at all costs. Part of the key to escaping the vicious cycle of "survival" is to make the decision that you're going to change your life, and committing to it. I know that sounds difficult, or over simplistic, but it's actually very important. Allowing one's self to be complacent with the current situation leads to stagnation, and eventually looking back when life is two-thirds over and wondering where the time has gone and what happened to the dreams, goals, and aspirations of the past. 

     I miss writing, and really do enjoy it. I finally made the decision that I'm no longer going to settle with survival and taking another mundane job just to pay the bills (unless I have to, and even then only temporarily while I pursue my real goals because homelessness sucks). I'm worth more than that, and life is worth more than that. Hopefully with a bit of talent, skill, and of course luck, I might be able to actually make some money doing this writing thing. It would be great to make money doing something I enjoy. I know it's been said before, but doing something you love for a living is key to a happy existence. Creating something in the world that a person can be proud of, at very least, will leave a person with a sense of accomplishment and fulfillment even if it doesn't necessarily make them rich and just merely pays the bills (although getting rich doing something you love is a nice bonus). 

    So with all that said, I intend to write. I mean it too, about anything. I've spent too much time going over my thoughts privately and in my head instead of writing them down. Now I may be no Plato in regards to philosophy, or the Hemingway of fiction, but I'm not trying to be. I'm my own person. After all, who did Shakespeare compare himself to? Do you really think that he expected that his works would be taught and studied in high school literature classes and University courses? I am willing to bet not. I'm not expecting that either, but the point is there's no way to predict what my future will hold, or how people will regard my works today, or 10, 100, or 1000 years from now. All I can do is write and pursue my dreams, and do everything I can to make everything work out for the best.