The Life We're Living

What are you afraid of?

At first thought, I might say pain or catastrophe. But when I think about it,

I'm afraid of being trapped.

We live busy lives, don't we? At this moment, instead of writing this, I could be (a) practicing my piano (b) doing school (c) working on my album (d) brainstorming my novel (e) editing a film project (f) practicing my dance moves (g) getting some family time. 

But no, I have to work first on this blog post. Not that I'm complaining about having to write, I'm just disappointed that I always leave it till the last minute. And I mean, Every. Single. Time.

The problem with all of this is that I can't focus. I can't slow down. I can't rest.

Yes, yes, I do get my sleep and I do take breaks. But I'm never at peace, do you know the feeling? 

And I've read the blog posts and I've told myself, I need to cut back. But how? Most of these are serious commitments that I can't just walk away from easily. Most of these have deadlines, most have other people involved. Eventually, the only things I can say no to are the things I want to do, but don't need to do. Or if I work on them, I can't focus, I can't always concentrate when I've got more important things to do. 

I don't think it's healthy. It chokes life out of creativity and poisons free time. But what greatly troubles me, is how it's inescapable. 

This wild, frantic pace frightens me because it helps me to forget. It's only when you're taken out of this cycle, that you realize how much you long to change.

To illustrate my words, I wrote this on my plane ride back to America from Africa.

"I'm supposed to be concerned primarily with eternal things and not worry about temporal needs, but how can I prevent myself from slipping back? From losing the lessons learned?"

When I stepped off that plane, I desperately hoped that I wouldn't. Yet, here I am, four months later, caught right in the thick of it again.

How time flies.

The curse of this society is that we're not allowed to think, to look deeper and farther than ourselves. All this amazing wealth and opportunities but we never have time for any of it! The things that truly matter in our lives never seem to have real consequences in the immediate future like so many other trivial things do.

We're always worrying about our test scores, unfinished novels, or the latest drama in our circle of friends, but there's not always the same concern for drawing closer to God or developing healthy friendships. What about our splintering families or widespread addictions to social media or gaming? Why do we always have to wait before figuring these things out? 

People always tell me how mature I am for my age. Sure, maybe I am, but by what standards? Yes, I might have some things figured out, but already I'm regretting that it's taken me this long already. Just looking back a couple years makes me marvel at the mess I was and the person I am now. I'm still a mess, it's just harder for me to see it now.

And we all are. It takes strength to look at yourself honestly and admit the flaws you see. That's why the cycle is so hard to break. When we're too focused on the world around us and the demands it places on us, we can forget to look inside and realize the need to change. 

We simply don't have the time to confront the problems within ourselves. We put it off for later when we have more time. Apparently, once we graduate college, find a job, perhaps get married, that's when we'll have the time. 

It's. A. Lie. 

Life doesn't wait for you to get your affairs in order so that you can start polishing it into shape. No one is going to give you that push to move forward, to get in gear. If you want to see results in your life, then you need to move! There's no time to sit around waiting for the right moment. The moment is now, not tomorrow because one day there will be no more tomorrows.

We've got to start waking up and start taking charge of our own lives because ultimately, we're the only ones who are responsible for them. This cloud of busyness is a drug that has the power to destroy our lives. But if we're honest, this way of life is the one we're most comfortable with.

It's comfortable because it distracts, it numbs. We're living lives of quiet desperation and we don't even know it. The way out looks hard, uncomfortable, or exhausting, but we weren't made to be comfortable. 

We were made to live.

And live well.