Occasionally I take leaps when things get too comfortable. This means that sometimes I give up a safe and consistent thing in the hopes of something greater, banking on the future. This doesn’t always work out for me. When I do it in business, things tend to go my way or in a positive direction. When I do it in relationships, things go awry to say the least.
Small side note here to keep my ego on its toes but until maybe 2 years ago I pronounced “awry” as aw-ree.
It’s not that I hate feeling comfortable, I love it in a lot of ways and I am very much a creature of habit and would be woefully easy to assassinate if you knew my routine. It’s more that somewhere within the comfortable, there’s this consistency, and a little beyond that there’s this creeping sense of stagnation. Like I feel as though if I don’t take some massive leap, make a enormous life change, you know, uproot my entire life, end a very positive relationship, or change my whole personality, that I’ll get stuck and that this comfortable position will be all I ever have. And then I wonder, is that enough?
My polluted ego barks “No! It is never enough”, but the side of me that read and internalised some Taoism retorts that “greed only knows one word: more” and thus the argument continues. The louder ego usually takes hold and then I find myself in a completely different mode of living a few months down the line and either comfort starts to set in and the argument gradually resumes or I think, “fuck, that spiritual prick was right, everything was fine before” and then drift into some kind of depression. The depression usually culminates in my begrudging acceptance that I can’t exactly change the past, and a thought that somewhere down the line I will find what I’m looking for.
It’s kind of annoying that having some awareness of this doesn’t automatically give me the answer to how not to be like this
Anyway, for the past 10 months or so I tried to combat this instinct and decided to ground myself for a while. Despite a few near misses with enticingly cheap flights or some vague ideas of running away to go and study something inane, I did actually manage to stably remain in one place and mostly maintain a consistent personality. Go me.
But the 10 months is over, and I have taken a leap.
I like to think that this leap is different but I was asked by someone very dear to me “What are you running away from this time?” which threw a spanner in the works mentally.
The problem with the question is that it ignites paranoia within me and forces me to actually consider “Well, are you running away from something?”. Not a fun question to answer.
I then start to wonder if I’m actually taking leaps at all or if all I’m doing is running.
I’ve been wrestling with that question for a while and I will say that possibly there’s something I am running from.
For now I’d sooner not discuss it too deeply as I fear that writing a response to that one might take me down a sad little road for a while and I could do with avoiding that so here’s what I will say:
This time, I took the leap to get more out of life, and to try new things though as I write this, I notice I’m eating the same salad I eat everyday and I’m sat in the same slightly hunched manner staring at a screen as every day so… Well… There’s limits to how far I’ll leap.
Quotes I’m vibing with rn:
May we all have the chance to prove that money can’t buy happiness – Spike Milligan
Do not worry the whole world is waiting for you – Comment under a TikTok video about baby ducks crossing a path
You are struggling to find a purpose. For now, let your purpose be to better yourself – Seneca I think? Maybe Epictetus, honestly cannot find this one again…
Favourite song for now:
Sumb Luck 