Being Me

I just figured out that I’ve actually been doing, been living the life I want. I like my life. I like myself. I set up my room the way I want it to be. I set up my schedule the way I want it to be. I do the things I like, like knitting, cooking, walking in the woods. Hanging out with my friends. Without planning it, without even realizing it, I’ve set up the ideal life. I am where I want to be and I’m happy with that. I may be a little tired, sleepy even, I may be a little manic, I may be still searching (for what I don’t know) but I’m here. I’m present, clear, living with purpose (to be happy) and achieving it.

What more could you want?

Well, one thing I’ve been struggling with lately is my energy. I finally feel a little like I used to. This morning I felt the tug of possibility roll me out of bed and hit the ground running. It’s been a year and a half since I’ve felt that. What I realize is that this is just the tip of the iceberg. Continuing to take care of myself, love myself, eat well and exercise correctly is all key to my improvement and maximum self-realization. I realize that whatever I create is just that – something out of my head, no more or less real than the skating rink behind my tent, or the sleep dirt in my eyes. I realize more and more that I create my reality, so whatever I want to have happen, can and will.

I just have to decide.

Waiting and doing nothing is the hardest part. Doing nothing is all relative. In reality, doing nothing is life. I think of myself as a child, the middle child who actually got her chores done for Saturday morning cartoons, who was so concerned with not being lumped in with her “lazy” brother and sister that she did a lot of things she didn’t want to, just to be the ‘productive one’. I was doing those things for my father’s approval, to make my mom happy, to get a good word from my gymnastic coach.

Never for myself.

How far did this go?

I was with a guy for almost six years because his approval meant so much. I was afraid of life without it – afraid of life with myself. I’m beginning to recognize my cycle – I take a turn and reach the exit, that point of self-love and liberation, that self-solidity that I’ve been searching for. Instead of taking the step, leaving the cycle, I find a distraction, I run away. After Dan, I found Charlie. After Charlie, I moved to Bend. After Bend I moved to Yosemite, where I’ve finally become aware of my cycle, where I’ve found friends to help me exit it. I want to stop running. I have stopped running. And I am left with nothing.

I’ve given up climbing. I live far from my family. I realized I don’t want to write literary anything, that I knit to design, not because the process of knitting is that fun, that I read to escape, that I walk to exercise.

Where is the enjoyment in my life? What do I do because I want to?

I cook. I design knit things. I read silly and serious books. I spend time with my friends, usually doing nothing. I’m learning to give myself acupuncture, to evaluate my diet, my condition, my tongue, I’m learning to trust myself.

I’m learning to trust myself.

Because what I just learned, walking back into my tent after crying out my confusion and frustration and fear and sadness to the ever-willing listener and verbal distiller, John, is that what I’ve been doing here is what I’ve wanted to do all along, that all this really is just for me.

I’m not doing it wrong! I’m doing it right! This is my life. And I’m ok with that. I’m ok with whatever I might become because right now, I’m ok. Ondrej of Cone Stand fame explained it to me this summer – he said, “I live in a tent, and I’m ok. I scoop ice cream and say ‘our flavors are chocolate, vanilla, strawberry and cookies-n-cream’ and I’m ok.”

What I didn’t realize then, John reiterated for me now. It doesn’t matter what I end up doing with my life, as long as I’m happy. I could be an ice cream-scooper, a garbage collector, a window-cleaner, the president of the United States, a roomskeeper, a knit designer, I could be paid to speed-read bestsellers, it doesn’t matter. What matters, all that matters, is that I’m happy.

And happiness is a process. Just as I change every day, every second, so does what I like, what I get enjoyment from. You could call it an evolution of tastes, except my tastes at the end may not necessarily be better/more sophisticated than what I started with. It’s all relative anyway, ennit? It’s just somebody’s opinion that making $100,000 per year is better than $10,000. That having a family is better than staying single, that traveling the world is better than living in the same place.

My current reverie (from this morning’s possibilities inspiration) is to live sustainably on a farm, producing all that I need to live, with a group of my friends, working in our small way to live in harmony with the land. Sounds peaceful, doesn’t it?

Thank you, John Blue, for listening to me. I suspect that you make this process much easier than if I was on my own. For that matter, thanks to all Yosemites and the other people in my life – Bree, Marina, Kelly and Ivy, Lasey and Shannon – thank you for sharing in my life with me.