So the song goes...
I'm just a believer
That things will get better
Some can take it or leave it
But I don't wanna let it go
I'm a little bit sheltered
I'm a little bit scared
I'm a little bit nervous
I'm goin' no where
I'm a little bit jealous
I'm a little bit slow
I'm a little bit hurtful
And I don't wanna let it go
I am mostly an optimistic person and I really do believe that it will get better, whatever IT is. Life, relationships, jobs, kids, pets, knitting, whatever. But I also agree that I often don't want to let go of what things I have, even if they are hard difficult soul-crushing things. I'm not a big lover of change. Sometimes I embrace it whole-heartedly because things are so bad it can only get better and other times I think that things will be really great when they change and they turn out to be worse than it was before. I've heard that people fear change because they think the change will only ever be worse. But there's also a quote that "If nothing changes then nothing changes." Isn't that the greatest fear? Never growing, never evolving, never developing. I'm not the same person I was when I was in grade school or even high school. I'd like to hope I'm a better version of that person. But I really think that I'm also not as well rounded as I should be. I heard in a movie once that we should live spherically, in all directions at once. I feel that maybe my sphere is a bit lopsided. I'd like to round it back out, hopefully into happiness.
I like the part of the song where the singer's faults are listed. I'd agree that I'm too sheltered and scared to get out of my comfort zone. And I'm definitely nervous that I'm going no where. No where in my job, no where in my life, no where physically. It seems sometimes that seasons come and go and nothing is new. People actually ask me, "What's new with you?" and I have to think about it. Nothing spectacular. I finished knitting a hat. I started tomato seedlings. I finished some great books. I learned how to make tea properly. But that's not what they want to know. They're asking, "What life-changing things have happened to you?" For me, for probably the last decade, nothing. I go to work. I come home. I sleep. Repeat. Now we get to the part of the song where the singer is jealous. I'm jealous about a lot of things. Aren't we all? We read blogs and Facebook feeds and emails and texts and we are all at some point jealous of someone else. And others are jealous of us. It's a circle that won't ever be broken no matter how happy you are. But jealousy is the catalyst of change. It's good that I'm jealous of where someone went on vacation. Maybe I'd like to go there and never knew it. Maybe I'm jealous of something someone made. I could make it. Maybe I'm jealous of the adorable pictures of their kids always on my news feed. Time to ask myself the hard questions and do something about it. I guess as long as the jealousy doesn't eat into my own happiness, only spurs on more of it, it's okay. And I agree with the singer that I'm a little slow on the uptake of getting this life thing together. I don't know that I would have been ready at any other time in my life to make the decisions I want to make now. The ideas weren't fully formed in past-Carrie's thoughts. She didn't have any passion to move somewhere new or didn't know where she wanted to go. Living where she'd always lived and working where she saw herself someday working was good enough for her. It's not good enough for present-Carrie. And this is where I can be a bit hurtful. Admitting that you are unhappy to the people you live with and love is hard and it often comes out as hurtful towards them. That they have somehow caused your unhappiness. They tell you that you could have gone anytime you wanted, but inside you know that's not completely true. The guilt would have eaten you away and what you currently have is better than what you might have had if you had gone it alone. You just want to change and you want them to come along for the ride. You still don't want to go it alone but you're afraid they won't want to change with you.
There are more lyrics to the song, but these are the ones that are currently resonating strongly with me. It's made me reassess what I can and can't change. I know that I need to make money. As a rational adult I can honestly look at my situation and say that there is no way I could go back to school or do anything else that does not produce a constant income. I have bills and they have to be paid. So no matter how much I DESPERATELY would love to move and get a Master's Degree in Clinical Microbiology, it's not exactly feasible. (Thanks for the email though Melinda. I would have jumped on a plane the next day if I could have. It looks AMAZING.) But I can still have little victories. I can travel. I can take on new challenges and goals and make my way towards accomplishing them. We all get a little lost sometimes, but ultimately I still believe that it will get better.
So here are some of my goals:
Learn how to take amazing photos...
Travel to London...
Have some kids...
And take some time to really think about what I want to do in my career. I've been in my current job for almost 10 (!) years. Do I really want to be there 10 years from now? Do I want to do something else? This goal is probably the most scary of them all. It would mean giving up a steady income, health insurance, almost 3 weeks of paid leave every year and a number of other things. But if I don't look around at my options then I'll only kick myself later. It doesn't mean it needs to be immediately but I also need to keep my eyes open to the possibilities.
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