Tuesday, July 1, 2008

The Riddle of Life: Doing What Makes You Not Tired

Some advice given to me recently was to determine, if you're worn out all the time, what part of your lifestyle doesn't suit you. The line of thinking behind that is to assume that if you were doing exactly what you wanted to be doing and it was the perfect thing for your life, you would have the energy and enthusiasm to carry on tirelessly and in perfect equilibrium. On the one hand I want to say, "Hey! That's me! It's time to change my life! I am tired all the time." On the other hand, I think, "Isn't it just natural to be tired?"
Isn't it great to step back from your life, imagine you're standing on a balcony, looking from a distance onto your present life, and take an objective view of it and determine what you want to do differently? I do that sometimes, and I might be able to objectively figure out that what I'm doing is not exactly what I want to be doing, but it rarely helps to put into action what I think I know to do from up there in the metaphorical balcony. It might just take a while to get from metaphorical balcony to real life. It might be a metaphorical staircase away, but in real time it might take a few years to get back down to the earthly level and improve it.
I recognize when I'm tired because I drop everything. I want to do something simple, like pick up a piece of paper, and it slips right out of my hands. Three times. The worst times of being tired involve something heavy slipping right out of my hands and onto my bare feet. I've done that so many times that I have learned to immediately move my feet out of the way when I think I'm about to drop something. I might want to open a jar of pineapple with a can opener so I can have a little snack. I might want to put the can opener away in a drawer and the can opener gets in the way to prevent the drawer from closing. I might want to find a spoon to get the pineapple out of the can, and on the way across the kitchen to get a spoon, I step on something tiny that digs deep into my foot, causing pain. I might want to get the pineapple out of the can, but then it falls off the spoon onto the counter as I try to get the ever-elusive food. When it takes so much effort to do something as simple as get some fruit out of a can, I know I'm tired. Does this mean my life needs to change? I go up to my metaphorical balcony and when I look down upon myself in the kitchen, I realize I may be trying to fit six jobs into one life (or that I may need to wear shoes in the kitchen). If only I could figure out a way to work, hire a cook, a maid, a gardener, an accountant and a nanny, life would be absolutely perfect. I'd settle for just a cook. Or just a nanny. Or just a maid. I'd have endless energy.

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