What Exactly Do We Want?

Middle age is a great time to find out that we aren’t really sure...I mean, are you living the life you imagined?  What did you think it would look like?  Are you content with how it all turned out?  Or do you have longings, dreams and things you want to do that just don’t seem to fit into your every day?

For me, this middle time, where the kids are doing their own thing, work is well, fuck I don’t even know what to say about that, and the expanse of the rest of my life looms in front of me with the knowledge that my body and mind are on the decline and there is not that much I can do about it.  Sure there are preventative measures, but in the end, death comes for us all whether we want to acknowledge it or not...

I have about four different people living inside me right now...

The drifter.

The crazy cat lady.

The hermit.

The travel advisor.

The drifter gets into a sprinter van and is only heard from during remote times with service and an occasional post on social media.

The crazy cat lady is in full swing currently.  I did say no to someone who offered me a cat last week so I feel like she is holding at the current 11.  She feels safe and secure and is entertained daily by the furry felines who share her home.  If this is the way it all shakes out, not a bad way to go.  She also might have a pack of chickens, a gaggle of goats, a few horses and an alpaca.  Stay tuned...

The hermit, is a different version of the crazy cat lady, but without a social life.  The pull towards this is pretty compelling some days, like yesterday for example. Very little human contact, mostly just fur and feathers.

The travel advisor eschews the cats and takes off for parts unknown and is only reachable through her posts on social media from far flung corners of the world while she circumnavigates the globe.

The point is that on any given day one of these women is running my life and making completely incongruent plans for the rest of them.

What do I want though?

All of the above.  I want them all.  I want the travel van life.  I want the foreign travel.  I want all the cats and the honorable mention dog, with the chickens, goats, and the rest of the farm. I have no idea how it all shakes out but it is what I want. And that is the thing about wanting...you can want whatever your heart desires.  It doesn’t have to make sense.  It doesn’t have to be sane or realistic.  It can just be what you want.

I find that there is a gap between what I want and what is possible and within that gap is where what we REALLY want is born or dies.  What I will achieve or receive only happens if I work for it.  I am free to want whatever the fuck I do, but if I want to make it happen, that can only be an outgrowth of the work I am willing to do and the uncomfortableness I am willing to endure.

We can have whatever life we want, the one we dream about, the one we feel deeply in our soul, but that life will only come into full flower if we are willing to shoulder the responsibility that life entails and then do the work to bring it into fruition...

My experience?

We get the life we work for.  We get the life we are willing to ask for and then sacrifice to bring into existence...so it kind of means that we will get the life we want only if we are willing to do the work to bring it into being...

If you don’t like your life, what have you done to change it?

For me, I can see how much my resistance to discomfort stalls me out a great deal of the time. I can have the life/lives I want, I just have to be willing to grow beyond that which is comfortable and move myself into doing the internal work to figure out what is most important to me and then having the courage to grow through all the discomfort what obtaining that life will require of me.  I can’t stay comfortable and safe, I have to be willing to take risks, to get outside the comfort zone and live the life I want...

I am still figuring it all out over here.  Right now I vacillate between crazy cat lady and hermit but I say that as I leave for a trip today and have another planned next weekend.  I may never get the goats and alpaca...but perhaps, just maybe I am already living my best life...

Again, still...