Thoughts in a Whirl

Been doing a lot of thinking lately about where I am in life. What I've been doing with it. What I want to do with it. Where I am in general and am I happy? It's frustrating not being able to adequately answer such questions efficiently. I've been tossing around the same two questions for a little over a week now and still have come up with little. Those questions? What makes you happy? What are you passionate about?

Easy enough questions to answer correct? You'd think so but that just doesn't seem to be the case with me. Truth is I've spent so much of my life trying to make things better for everyone else and neglecting myself in the process. I always have to make sure everyone is happy, everyone has a good time, everyone is doing well...everyone that is, except for me. Me, yeah the one person you shouldn't neglect is the one I have neglected the most. Always looking out for everyone else and putting myself, my thoughts, my feelings, my life on the back burner to please everyone else. I'd like to believe, have actually believed, that I've gotten beyond that "everyone is more important than you" deal, but sadly it's still there hovering in the back of my mind. I always sacrifice myself for my work, for others and never, well not never more like seldom, focus on me. Why? I don't know that's just the way that I am...

What makes someone do that? Focus so much on everyone else that they fade to the back burner and blend into the background never to be seen, never to be noticed always trying to make others shine brighter. Why do I do that? Why? I don't know, but I've done it far too much. Something at some point has got to give, something, somewhere, at some point will give.

So back to the initial questions posed at the start of this new idea of a journal: What are you passionate about? What makes you happy?

Should really be posing the question: why can't I answer that as easily as I should be able to, shouldn't I?

So in answer to those two questions? I've written down a few things, a very miniscule amount of things...that makes me sad. Why sad? Because there are so few things listed. What am I passionate about? It would seem in the last week and a half I've only come up with a few scant things. In a nut shell thus far?

Birds and birdwatching

Abandoned places

Architecture

Ghost stories

Chicago

Yeah that just about sums it all up. Sad I know. In answer to the "what makes you happy?" question...

The jury's still out on that one.

Pathetic isn't it? Absolutely pathetic.

Windows

Windows are many. Some are small, some are tall, some are large and some are wide. Some are shuttered. Some are open but all are unique.

I've had a journal online since 2004. I've created other journals on other platforms, delved into all those little social sites and have come back with a select few I find enjoyable. Those journals I've kept I've tried desperately to keep up. I am apparently an overachieving procrastinator because most have fallen to the wayside and made little progression beyond 'hi this is me and this is what I want to do'. It's frustrating really to want so badly to have one special little place to share all but know that you just can't seem to stick with it. Excuses run rampant: 'that one's all writing and fandom-y stuff,'this one was a failed attempt at discussing my art journaling,' 'this one just didn't get beyond entry number four' and 'that one I just don't have time for.'

The doubts creep in piling one on one: who will read it? Do I really want to share that? Am I ready to do this? I'll wait a little longer. No one will ever care what I have to say or do. No one really cares, so what's the use? Yeah, I've been there multiple times, recycling those same old excuses and more. I've tried the "fresh start" approach of 'no one knows me so go for it', but get upset when no one follows me or seems remotely interested. The doubts creep in again and the blog, journal, whatever again falls to the wayside soon to be forgotten, returned to only when I have a desire to share something and become too intimidated by who knows what to continue.

We've all been there I'm sure, some more than others. Me? I'm a pro at it, so why am I here again? Why do I feel this strange desire to try again and again? Why do I struggle so much with everything? I don't know. I'm not really sure, but damn it I want to do SOMETHING more.

Lately I've been toying with these very things. I'd like to think I'm a happy person. I have a beautiful home. I have a small yard. I own a car, and I have my writing but I'm still depressed. My job is one of the biggest stresses around, not really the job itself but the people I work with. I come back from a trip feeling happy, excited, great and enter that building only to be slammed in the face by negativity. It builds and builds and within a half hour my happy mood has dimmed, darkened, winked out only to be replaced with frustration, depression, sadness and hindered by despair. I try to stay positive, try to stay afloat but these weights pull me down and I sink down, down, down...

I have to do something to regain happiness. I can't leave the job or I'll lose the house I've owned for just over a year. It wold crush me if that happened and there's no other places that seem to be hiring, so I go back to thinking. I opened my art journal and wrote down some words, just a few simple words to think on: What are you passionate about?

I wrote that question out at the beginning of the week and sadly have little listed, so I expanded the page incorporating other questions to help me along the way:

What can't you wait to share, to shout out to the world? WHAT MAKES YOU HAPPY?

What makes you happy?

I'm nearly forty now and you'd think this question would be an easy one to answer. It troubles me that it is not.

Doors

The Secret Door to the Land of the Fairys by *Estruda on deviantART

A door, a simple picture of a door taken by someone, somewhere because it intrigued them, fascinated them, made them smile. A door one's curiosity would love to open and explore. What lies on the other side? Could it be a living room, a kitchen or a whole new world? Could the door lead to an enchanting little street in an enchanting little town or a world purely drawn from the realms of make believe?

Sometimes I feel like that door, all closed up, locked up tight, hidden from everything and everybody. The door stays shut only opening on occasion sometimes wide, sometimes half way, sometimes a mere inch. Sometimes a hole or two get drilled into that door, little pieces of a person leaking out after staying hidden for so long, buried.

The purpose of this journal will be to draw open that door, nudge it time and again, a little this day, a lot that day and see if we can't open it fully. What remains is steeped in mystery. Shall we dare to take a peek and see if the door will budge?