And now that I’m here, I have. Ta dah! When we set expectations for ourselves, really we’re the only ones who know if we’re meeting them. I don’t know about you, but I’ve backed out of a whole lot of things that I’ve decided to do. Granted I have a pretty active imagination and am always coming up with new ideas so there’s a decent amount of “throwing it out there and see what sticks” that goes on. More of an ongoing curiosity than anything else. A desire of exploration and examination is another way I’ve heard it put.
I may have mentioned this before, but “Why?” is my favorite question. We attribute that to small children a lot in our culture, but I personally respect that about kids. It’s a desire to learn. I think some people, especially tired & busy adults, can just find it exhausting to have someone ask them “why” all the time so they get tell their kids it’s annoying and then that’s what becomes they’re internal belief, ad nauseam. In some beliefs though it’s respected to look at the world with child-like wonder. I like to think I fall a lot closer to that school of thought.
I remember telling Tanya about an idea I had been dreaming up once and she told me she was worried it wasn’t going to work out and then I would be let down and take it really hard. Not an ill-founded concern because she’s seen me sad and frustrated and even enter “the doom spiral” when something hasn’t worked out at least a handful of times in the decade plus we’d been together at that point. I explained to her that the heartbreak is part of dreaming. It sucks, no doubt. But sometimes, sometimes it works out and you get to do something incredible.
Life is going to be full of ups & downs. I understand that some people prefer to keep the road as smooth as possible. I know I go through periods when I need that, and the older I get, the more I can admit I like those roads. I’m not sure I’ll ever stop dreaming up new ideas and possibilities though.
Which brings me back to the expectation that I set inside my head. The latest thing I decided to dream up is what you’re reading right now. “What if I just decided to write every night?” Not so much like a journal, because that’s for me. Just something that I can share with you just in case you might find something, anything, in it. By saying “every night” it can feel daunting like “Oh geez, what if I’m just too tired, or I miss a night or, or, or.” Maybe it’s like not drinking alcohol anymore though. Maybe it’s a thing I just kind of choose for a while until it just because a thing that I don’t even think about because doing the opposite feels more odd. Probably not, but let’s find out.