The Journey

A journey of a thousand miles must begin with a single step. -- Lao Tzu

Periodically we all go through this period where we wonder if we are on the right path. Particularly for me, I get in these jobs / places / relationships (and sometimes all three at once) in which I wonder if it's where I'm supposed to be, where I want to be, or if it's my "last job".

I want my last job. I feel like I want to get where I'm going, to skip the book and read the last page to see how it all ends. But then I think about that other saying...

Success is a journey, not a destination. The doing is often more important than the outcome.

Like Shannon, mediocrity wears on me like a horrible sandpaper suit. I slide into daily and it degrades me as time passes. It is difficult to expect great things for yourself and then wake up every day knowing you won't use even half the skills or talents that you have. It feels wrong, it feels wasteful, it feels disappointing.

Every day you may make progress. Every step may be fruitful. Yet there will stretch out before you an ever-lengthening, ever-ascending, ever-improving path. You know you will never get to the end of the journey. But this, so far from discouraging, only adds to the joy and glory of the climb. -- Sir Winston Churchill

Which comes first, the optimism or the success? I wanted to say that it's easy for Churchill to feel the joy and glory of the climb when he was a brilliant, creative, articulate man who probably was achieving pretty much everything he set out to do. But why would he be any more capable of maximizing his journey than I mine? Probably no real reason that I can see except that I feel like I'm wandering blindly through the woods with absolutely no clue as to where I'm going. Is that bad or is that normal? Probably the norm as far as most people are concerned. Most of us are just bumping around in the dark.

In the middle of the journey of our life I came to myself within a dark wood where the straight way was lost. -- Dante Alighieri

What is the trick of those who make the best of their lives, who really maximize the time they have on the planet and pack every second of the day with brilliance, intensity, and fullness? I have wondered this for a long time, but still don't have an answer and it's frustrating.

No man with a man's heart in him, gets far on his way without some bitter, soul searching disappointment. Happy he who is brave enough to push on another stage of the journey...

Onward, onward, upward.

Twenty-Something - Episode III

A very wise man once wrote:

“If you would have a woman love you, fill her about the brim with love of herself – all that runs over is yours.”

This is exactly what Matt did for me. In fact, he’s the only love I’ve ever had that even attempted. What I was to him was not a name but what he called the essence of pining, and he filled me not with empty words, but a real sense of masterpiece.

We met over dinner at a noodle stand a few blocks from the market shopping district in downtown Taipei. Mutual friends had already decided we’d be a perfect match, and arranged the no-pressure gathering of friends.

Tall and athletic, witty and intense, handsome and intelligent, he fit my desire like a standing ovation.

We all spent that night in lively conversation over drinks at several of the city’s cozy, relaxed places that catered to American expatriates. The soft light of the sun had already warmed the windows of Mama’s Place when we finished our bacon-and-egg breakfast and walked into the morning.

As I opened the red metal door of my third-story apartment, the phone rang. “I haven’t smiled this much in a long time,” Matt said when I answered. “And I have a feeling, you’ll be making me smile for a good long time.”

He always said that’s how it was, that I was the treasure (with the best ‘booty’ around) and he was the bandit, getting away with something he didn’t deserve.

I have a box of letters he penned during our two-year relationship, which tells the truth of the matter. In one cherished note, he wrote:

“Freedom is the right to search for someone who will rid you of this desire. You are my freedom, you are my desire, you are the right someone.”

He filled me to the brim time and time again. But, he never freed me from fear.

Thankfully, no man can do for you, what you can only do for yourself.


Georgia O’Keefe spoke the necessary words of an artist’s heart:

“I’ve been absolutely terrified every moment of my life and I never let it keep me from doing a single thing that I want to do.”

I know that cord and the balance required to bear it. It was laced throughout my twenties and even now is an ever-present filter though the stained glass of my life has formed a more reflective likeness.

The parts are forming the whole, and I’m discovering that what I have been to the companions of my life is a piece of who I am, a translucent display of who I was created to be.