Early Reflections

Could it be that life's only what you make it?

It's such an obvious lesson we should all learn by the time we're three years old. It's something we are reminded of time and again, which stares us in the face if we have even the most rudimentary reasoning skills.

But somehow we are really good at ignoring it.

I have the advantage of becoming easily comfortable with my own company. After the initial shock of loneliness and isolation, I can produce profound insight from my own private introspection. Thus has gone my longest tenure of private time in several years.

I've reflected on loneliness. I thrive in the company of my partner, but I also tend to become a bit of a psychic vampire around him. I seem to grow more, in a private and personal capacity, when I'm left to my own devices, with no crying shoulder. It leads me in new intellectual directions and teaches me logical self-sufficiency. An occasional bout of this is absolutely necessary for me to gain insight on my life and experiences and to grow as an individual. The loneliness does not ebb with time, but I see its productive results and thus its necessity.

I've reflected on my goals. Or rather, I've reflected on my expectations. I'm really tired of being depressed. I've been disappointed with most of my choices in life, especially as they relate to my career and professional future, for many years. Whilst I have a whole slew of directions in which I want to go and a catalogue of places I want to see myself in the years to come, my goals play a pitifully small part in my long-term life outcomes. It leads me to question the realism and logic of my goals, not to mention the sincerity of my ambition for being happy and fulfilled in the long run. Rather than see every unaccomplished goal of youth as a failure, perhaps I should judge myself strictly on outcomes. This is easy when I compare myself with who I was five or ten years ago, but incredibly self-defeating when I compare myself with others of my age who've had similar opportunities in life. Alas, this reflection is for now an unfinished chapter.

I've reflected on my outlook, on my attitude. My jaded, misanthropic cynicism is unlikely to dissipate soon (ever), but I think I too often allow myself to reflect an attitude and personna based on who I want to be, rather than who I am. I'm a flawed, judgemental, wishy-washy person who doesn't know what he wants. Too often I present myself as the pillar of principled sureity. It's mostly a facade. My happiness and enjoyment of life demand that I be happy with where I am, wherever I am; with who I am, whoever I am; and with what I accomplish, however seemingly small and no matter what effort (or lack thereof) I feel it required.

I always try to blame my perceived unhappiness on many outside sources. I've done it unapologetically for years. Most of my life even. This essay is perhaps my way of setting that right. There is an amazing freedom and renewed wonder at life and its possibilities that opens up every time I stop placing blame. When I accept responsibility, I often find there's nothing left to blame on myself. Why can't I hang onto that feeling?

Realizing life is what I make it lets me live for today. It lets me let the future take care of itself. It lets me enjoy my accomplishments and bask in my own success, however limited. It lets me stop seeing life as a battle to fight and start realizing that it's a project in which continued involvement is an end in itself - a success story merely by virtue of my ability to tell it.

No anxiety, no excuses. If I was unable to find happiness in the past, it was my fault for ignoring it at every turn. Or for purposely pretending it wasn't there, for whatever reason I gave at the time.

To the city that inspired these insights tonight, I offer to make peace. San Francisco, nothing was this city's "fault". Nothing can ever be the fault of anything but me. San Francisco is what it is, and I can love it for every part of what it is, even if I can't ultimately live with it for some of the same reasons - I can appreciate this city as a present visitor and a past denizen, even if I realize my goals and needs are not ultimately met by it.

Despite how well-founded my accusations seemed from the day I set foot in this city, and regardless of the mountains of evidence I felt I'd managed to accumulate over the years, San Francisco did me no wrong. I wronged this city by refusing to let it contribute to my happiness - to my life - by refusing to find ways in which to fit it into my life. I don't want to say this about anything, anymore.

Play the hand I've drawn, and make it great. A radical change of tone? Yes, because life's what I make it.