Goal #38

Just about everyone knows now: my family is going to Ireland this summer!  We leave Sunday and will be there for about 2 weeks.  I'm, you know, just a tad excited.  Just a little.  To go to the place I've wanted to go my entire life.

In placing myself under house arrest today to get my enormous pile of stuff done, I wound up doing what I always do whenever I need to clean or pack or do anything that's required of me: I look at old things.  I pull out old notes, pictures, stories, art, books, ANYTHING that has a connection to my past, sit myself down on my bedroom floor, and go through it all.  It never fails.  I don't know why this is my go-to procrastination technique, but there you have it.  So naturally, when my laundry hamper overflowed yesterday and I ran out of underwear, the need to do it today translated to Erica sitting by her bookcase looking at her experiments with Prismacolor pencils and markers from when she was 16.

And somehow that led to reading my French children's books.  Which led to me digging out my old list of 38 goals that I had to do for a high school project my freshman year and that I've never thrown away.  Of course, "Visit Ireland" was goal #4.  That'll be nice to scratch off.  My goals have changed drastically over the years, but I was quite surprised to read goal #29: "Learn about advertising, maybe?"

I had no idea I was that interested in that subject field that early.  I thought I hadn't been interested in it until my senior year of high school, when we had to do ad critiques in class (a daily habit, now!).  It was fairly interesting to see that maybe this has been a goal of mine longer than I realized.  On the other hand, for a while now, I've been thinking that maybe this isn't quite the goal for me anymore.

I'm still testing the waters around me and trying to find a place where I feel comfortable.  I recently had an interview for an internship that left me very thoughtful for a while.  I don't HAVE to work in an agency and I don't HAVE to follow the straight lines that I painted out for myself for so long.  There are so many options and so many open ends and so many... choices.  Choices terrify me.  Choices lead to change.  And we all know my fear of change, and my recent battle to overcome that fear.

The reason I started my OGTAD journal was because of some things that happened last summer.  I was so unhappy, and I finally realized that only I have the power to make myself feel whatever emotions.  No one has the power to make me feel upset, guilty, ashamed, embarrassed, or anything of the sort unless I let them have that power.  I chose OGTAD to show myself the good things about my days to end each day on a good note, to give myself the power to be positive and go to bed happy every night.  This past year of OGTAD has been leading up to seeing whether or not, finding myself in a similar situation this summer, I have learned anything from my experiment and if I can keep in mind the amazing lessons I have learned, and more importantly, the things that I have learned about myself.

It is not easy.  But everything that's happened over the last year has taught me that I do have the ability to overcome the things that I fear.  But it's NOT easy.  And I can't expect life to be easy, and I can't expect myself to just glide over any obstacles.

The final goal on my list, from when I was 15, is very, very simple: Goal #38: "Do not rush!"  I think that's the most important goal on my list, in my life, and I don't think that at 15, I had any idea how important that sentiment would be to me at 21.  Do not rush.  It is not a race.  I have all the time in the world.  I have my entire life.  And if my "entire life" should consist of only the next few moments, if I were to die tomorrow, then I have to ensure that I am happy.  There are so many ways to achieve that happiness.

Becoming a better person has been exhausting, stressful, almost embarrassing at times, and though this is a goal, journey, and task that will never have an end, I think so far, it's been worth it.  Taking up the idea of being constantly aware of myself has been the biggest thing I've ever done in my life.  That's why goal #38 is so big to me now.  I wonder what significance it held for me when I was 15.  I wonder what I was so worried about that I felt I was rushing.  I cannot rush life.  I can only hope to take everything in stride.

My next stride is Ireland!  Traveling makes me think, big time.  I'm so excited to see what revelations about myself I'll make in this beautiful country.  My pen is already poised.  My journal was the first thing I packed.  But even as I look forward to my trip, I'm aware: do not rush.