Am I Living the Dream?

OK....so here I am back.....back to the old blogging board. I'm here in my new stage of life. I took the leap and feel quite intrepid at times.

I'm living out in the boonies and realizing just how much of a city girl I have become over the last 12 years. I'm in prime ATV country now so I will admit to falling for that redneck-ish vice. I'd even go out shooting....as long as it was clay or paper targets. No hunting for this one. All things considered, I really don't fit in with people around here. I consider myself pretty progressive on most issues. People around here believe everything Fox News tells them. I've had to do more censoring of myself in the last two months than I have in years. I didn't say much to most people before about my opinions on issues. Now I do it even less. Sad.

Thankfully I've got a lot to keep me busy with school work and all the necessary things for my grad school application. Thankfully my classwork in artistic endeavors doesn't require me to censor myself. Equal opportunity therapy.......what a lovely concept.....which is why I'm so in love with it. Maybe I really am living the dream. In fact, all things considered, I'm pretty sure that I am.

What's the balance?

OK what gives? I have spent so much time wrapped up in my past, tossing it around in my mind, reliving it constantly etc. You always hear the quotes about not remembering the past and therefore being condemned to repeat it. Even one of my favorite Bob Marley songs says "In this bright future, you can't forget your past."

With some really hard emotional work I have learned to not get so caught up in my past destructive cycles. I've put my behind in my past as Pumbaa so eloquently said in "The Lion King." I have a real chance at grabbing something that would be representation of the hell that my past was and the partial victory that I have acheived over said past. I have decided to help adoptees who don't have the voices that they need in a sort of unconventional way. It is absolutely perfect too. I get so excited just thinking about all the possibilities.

Interlaced with this past is a life that I have built in the city where I am at right now. That includes old friends and attachments to this city and things I would do here. It also includes great newer friends who I feel have possibilities for more great times and learning experiences. I've built a life here. But in some ways I can feel doors closing as well.

I'm just so torn because I see the fantastic possibilities and I'm so excited for them. On the flip side, I feel terror at giving up something that has in some ways become mediocre (even with the good new stuff) for something which I'm pretty sure would launch me into what I dream about versus what I let myself live with.

The pursuit of happiness?

Its been a particularly good day, even up to the last week or two. I'm happy right now. In fact, I'm REALLY happy. Its not even to rebel against all the doom and gloom of life today. Everywhere I turn it seems like there is something wanting to steal my happiness. I don't want to let it go though. I think I subconsciously decided to put a Patronus Charm around myself so that all these Dementors couldn't have their way with me. Sorry I just got done watching that particular HP installment so that was the first comparison that popped into my brain. As I've walked through my happy days recently I've thought about the phrase "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness". I used to use that phrase a lot when asked how I was doing or what I was thinking about and didn't feel particularly inclined to share. But that's just me. I'm a smart a** that way sometimes.

When I think of pursuit I think of running after something and it implies a certain degree of exhaustion something implies to me that the "pursuit" is always there, seemingly just beyond our grasp....sorta like a treadmill, running and running and never getting anywhere.

Is this what Thomas Jefferson intended when he wrote those words? I've thought quite a bit about it lately and I really don't believe so. On their own, these are great and powerful happy words. However, I think that in order for you to see where I am going with this you need to consider it on the basis of it being a family of words, not the individuals themselves. Life and liberty are the parents and the little rugrat is the pursuit of happiness. The definition of life is pretty self-explanatory. You have to be breathing first of all in order for this to work. My Random House dictionary tells me that the definition of liberty is "freedom from arbitrary or despotic government" or "freedom from captivity and confinement". Even though this is coming unhinged in today's society it still more or less exists. So we're alive and we're free for the most part. Good for us. So now that we are alive and free, what comes next? The "pursuit" of happiness which, I believe, is a product of being alive and at liberty to choose the path and station which we believe will give us the peace and prosperity that we desire. I believe that that is what our Creator had in mind for us and that is what I believe Thomas Jefferson meant when he wrote this. The problem is that somehow we the people have screwed it up. Somehow we have turned, as a society, toward thinking that happiness is external so therefore it needs to be "pursued". In other words, we have actually taken Thomas Jefferson literally, way too literally. We have learned to think that happiness comes in the form of other people or things. So that automatically sets us up for problems. Not only are we denying our inner arsenal and capacity for real love and happiness but we do endlessly crazy things like working at jobs we hate, spending money we don't have to buy things that we don't realize won't fill the need, all the way down to inflicting violence on ourselves and others. Most of us are no longer acquainted with our power because we as a society gave it up for whatever reason. Everything we need to create real and lasting freedom, happiness and to stop giving away our power is right here within ourselves.....no mad grasping or treadmills involved.