JUST DECIDE TO DO THE THING
For as long as I can remember I always knew I wanted to be a writer.
I was on this pathway of being the GOOD student and girl, I was top of every class academically, always, and the PLAN was to become a lawyer.
Got the grades for it, too, started studying Arts and was going to switch into Law/Arts, but within less than a week at University it hit me:
I’m not going to do this, actually.
Nobody is watching to make sure I show up.
Nobody even knows!
At Uni I didn’t get that instant feedback right away, and to top it off I guess I just realised:
Huh.
I don’t think I WANT to actually do this whole normal life thing, actually.
Growing up it wasn’t ALWAYS about becoming a lawyer. That basically became a pathway because a) I liked to argue and win (haha, what a shock), and b) it was a good EGO goal to chase.
If I’m a lawyer then I must be SUCCESSFUL!
The other thing, though, which I remember thinking about doing a LOT, was being a writer. By writer I meant ‘journalist’, since in school that’s the logical career outcome version of wanting to write.
I mean, really – you don’t get a career as a writer like an AUTHOR or something, do you? That’s not very practical! And what other ways are there to write anyway!
So, simple:
Become a lawyer, or become a journalist.
Going back further still than that, and now as far as what I can remember, since I was very very small, it was artist.
Funny…
How we always end up back where it was we started, where our dreams began, where WE began.
If you think about it, you’ve ALWAYS known what it is you’re meant to be doing!
Haven’t you?
Of course when we’re young and we have these dreams, these desires, this calling, and this thing that says –
“I just want to create”
We don’t know HOW on earth to DO that.
How do I be an artist, what does that even mean? Okay, I don’t know how, so maybe I want to be a writer, but how do I do THAT?!
Be a journalist, hmmm … okay be a lawyer! That’s a fancy job! Career counsellor approved, and everything!
Let’s do it.
And then …
Well, then.
You embark, don’t you, upon the normal life. Trying so DESPERATELY hard to actually get it to work!
And it just –
Doesn’t.
Quite.
Seem to FEEL like it should.
I don’t know about you, but I’ve just never been that GOOD at following through on things that don’t FEEL good, y’know?
And I might tell myself ALL the stories in the world about how I’m GOING TO DO IT THIS TIME NO REALLY FOR REAL!
I’ve done it with study.
I’ve done it with jobs.
I’ve done it with RELATIONSHIPS.
I’ve even done it with diets and training regimes!
And in the end, but ONLY 100% of the time, if it’s not a FIT for me and I mean a SOUL fit, I find myself –
Walking away.
And when I say walking? I mean RUNNING LIKE A BAT OUT OF HELL, #stealthexit style, normally.
Now you see her –
Now you don’t!
lol.
I always did love that movie … I always did love ANYTHING that was about DISAPPEARING, escaping, whoosh –
buh bye.
Still do 
😉
And what it was, REALLY, was that deep inside of me I did just KNOW –
(As I know you do too)
– I wasn’t born for this whole … LIFE thing. NOT LIKE THIS. I’m going to do it MY way ... somehow! Even though I don’t really know what that is or how it would look or ANY of it.
But I’ll figure it the fuck OUT, just TRY TO STOP ME!
Of course here is the truth. The truth which it too me some time to admit to myself, and perhaps you too. PERHAPS YOU’RE LYING TO YOURSELF THIS VERY SECOND ABOUT IT!
And the truth is this:
The ONLY thing, the only PERSON, who ever tried to STOP me, was me.
Because other people, with their well-or-not-intentioned suggestions or even COMMANDS, do not actually get to choose how you play life. The GREAT news is that YOU get to do that.
The sobering news, perhaps, is that YOU GET TO DO THAT AND ALSO YOU MUST.
It’s actually not optional, y’know …
EITHER way you’re choosing! So if you look around right now and you don’t LOVE WHAT YOU SEE, or if you look inside right now and if you don’t ADORE how you feel, or if you look to the future right now and you’re not just so GEE-DARN excited and gleeful and grateful about it, then get a fucking grip baby.
You did this.
You did ALL of it.
The ball was squarely in your court since the day you were FORMED, in fact, because God gave us the gift of INFINITE choice.
It’s a blessing.
It’s a responsibility.
It’s EXCITING!
And it’s just motherfucking FACT.
And here is what else:
This idea that you have, which perhaps you’ve not really stopped and thought about or else you’d realise how non-sensical it is, that there should be somebody TELL YOU HOW TO PLAY LIFE – your life! – telling you how to travel your own pathway, well –
That idea is gonna have to go.
You’re not a child anymore.
Dreaming of being an artist.
Knowing that somebody someway you will be.
And you’re also not a teenager being told by the world – and LISTENING – that there is a right or a wrong way to do life ‘properly’.
Are you??!
So why are you acting it?
You’re an adult now, and if you want it to happen you damn sure KNOW you can make it happen but you also gotta go DO that.
What it takes.
No matter what it takes.
Until it takes.
Yes?
YES.
And you get to choose to keep the childlike wonder and the dreaming and the playfulness, or you get to choose to bring it in NOW, that’s the beautiful thing! Life just gets better and better the further along you go.
I think that one of the most powerful lessons we can each learn about life is not how to go out there, learn to succeed or achieve, find or build a roadmap to wealth, acclaim, respect, worthiness!
It’s that the answers were already there.
The entire freaking time.
I know for me, I spent so many years wandering and looking and trying to try, all of the things I was told I should.
And then?
I just decided to write.
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