Tuesday, February 16, 2010

Change

Change. It's the coins in your pocket left over from your last purchase. You do it when you put different clothes on. "Hey, let's do something different for a change," you'll say to a friend as you sit on the couch and watch re-runs on TV. You watch a character in a movie plead with their departing lover, "Please don't go, I'll change!"

Change probably has more definitions that I would care to count. It's a noun, and a verb. Verb "Change" means 1] to make the form, nature, content, future course, etc., of (something) different from what it is or from what it would be if left alone 2] to transform or convert 3] to substitute another or others for; exchange for something else, usually of the same kind 4] to give and take reciprocally; interchange 5] to transfer from one (conveyance) to another 6] to give or get foreign money in exchange for. 7] to become different 8] to become altered or modified. And Noun "Change" has more meanings! 1] the act or fact of changing; fact of being changed 2] a variation or deviation 3] the substitution of one thing for another... the list goes on and on.

Change. How strange it seems. Every day on the new year we resolve to change something about our old lives. Quit smoking. Lose weight. Run more. Those things are so trivial though... okay maybe not the smoking as that can eventually kill you... and if you're obese the weight thing might be in the same category... but what I'm really trying to get at here is the real deal. Change. We do it. Or say we do, but what happens when you promise change, either to yourself or someone else, and you never do it? You stab them in the back, that's what. You hurt yourself, and you hurt other people. You say you'll do something, hopefully for the better, because that's what I associate change with... you change, for the better, because who the hell would want to change for the worse? But it happens. People change over time. Grow comfortable with each other. Let slip the things they shouldn't. And then one day you're staring at the person sitting across from you wondering when they got they way they are and how come you didn't notice sooner that you don't agree with how they are now. How do you handle that? It slaps you in the face, and then you're left wondering what the hell happened and when and why you missed the neon flashing sign that maybe could have stopped everything... and what if it's you? What if the person you're staring at is your own damned reflection and suddenly you realize you can't stand what you see?

You change. You're disgusted with yourself. Why would you want to stay that way? This is YOUR life. You change. You get off of one train, and onto the other. But it's really not that easy. Habits are hard to break. Quitting smoking is heard to do. Not eating that delicious cheeseburger from McHeartAttacks? It's hard to do. Running that mile when you're out of breath after five minutes is hard to do. Changing yourself from the inside out? I find it's nearly impossible. Unless you have no other choice. Then you have to do it. It's either that or be someone you hate for the rest of existence. You change in hopes that you can have another chance at all the things you screwed up in. That job interview where you forgot to take your gauges out and didn't iron your shirt? You'll change it, go back, and try again. Worst case scenario? You don't go back to the same place, but find yourself in a similar situation in the future. An opportunity re-presenting itself father on down the line. You changed for that chance, for that moment where you look someone in the eye and you can think to yourself, "I did it", and hope that they know that you did. That you are. Change doesn't happen over night, it's far too complex for that, but change can happen.

You BEGIN to CHANGE because you're WORTH it. Because you'd be DEVASTATED if you didn't. Because FORGIVENESS is what we as a species seek. Because in REALITY, you don't want to HATE yourself. You want to LOVE yourself, and be loved by others. You CONTINUE to change because its not something that you can stop doing, if you do stop, then you never really started to begin with, did you? If in the end, change is all you have to do? Then it's really not so hard, now is it?

So drop the cigarette. Put down the cheeseburger. Take a drink of water, and finish running that mile. Do it for yourself. Do it for the ones you love.

Even if you cant go back, you can keep going forward, and who knows? Maybe you'll cross paths with something later on in life and realize that this is why you changed in the first place.

Sunday, February 14, 2010

Continue

Begin. Continue. End. You do it every day. You start something. You endure it. You end it. How do you decide what to continue though? How do you know what's best for you? Or do you ignore what's best for you and do what's best for other people?

Continue is defined in the dictionary as a verb meaning 1] to go on after suspension or interruption, 2] to go on or keep on, as in some course or action, 3] to last or endure, and 4]to remain in a place; abide; stay.

Continue. It sounds so easy. You start something. For example, a sport. You've played your entire life, and you go to college, on a grant for this particular sport. You're on the team, but you've been benched. You sit on the bench for a whole season. You understand, you were a freshman. You continue to go to practice. You continue to show up, and be a reliable teammate in the hopes that you'll play soon. Season two. Benched. You know you're better than some of the people in the game, but you're still benched. What to do? Quit because things aren't going well for you? You're not playing, but maybe deserve to. Do you continue to endure the shame of being benched game after game? You've put your whole life into this, and now it's judgement day. You have two choices. End or continue. How do you decide?

Okay, lets get a little deeper. Relationship. Love. Been dating for a while now. You love each other, but it's hard (aren't all relationships?) and you don't know if you're happy anymore. Or worse, you don't know if your significant other is happy anymore. You've got memories, you've got mutual friends, family, etc. Ending this relationship will be devastating to you, to your significant other. But there's a chance that if you stuck together, continue your relationship, that things can get better. Hold on or let go? Do you give up on each other, call it quits and work on being alone? Do you stick together and have faith, have trust that you can fix it, work through the problems? Let's escalate it a little bit. Now this isn't just a relationship, this is a marriage. This is house, kids, pets, the whole deal. This is more than just a few months of being with someone. This is years. This is life. It gets more complicated, eh?

How do you make choices like that? Do you do what's best for you? What's best for them? How do you decide? Lists of pros and cons? Talking? Being alone and just making a sole decision. Me? Believing in the best is something I struggle with. Right now? I can't decide what to continue, what to end. I'm scared that if I let go, I'm letting go forever, and I will never be able to get back what I have. If it were up to me, I would suffer through the misery of fighting and work on being together. I feel like giving up all the memories, the company, the love... none of it is worth it. None of those wonderful things are worth giving up for some hard times.

Back to the sports team. I have a friend. Okay, I have two friends. And both of them are in that situation. One of the friends quit the team. The other one hasn't. The one who hasn't says, "I've put too much into this to give up now." The one that did said that he loved it, but it just didn't matter as much to him. I doubt it was an easy decision for him to make, but in the end he did, and I would believe that he's happier now than he was when he was benched on the sidelines.

How do you decide to continue? Continue ever single day? What if you're at the very bottom, looking up, wondering how you'll ever get up there again? What if it looks so hopeless, that you don't know what to do? You don't know whether or not to keep breathing let alone keep doing the things you've been doing all along... Every thing's gone wrong, and when you look at it from a different perspective? You did it to yourself. How do you live with yourself? Here, 'Continuing' gets pretty tricky. If you stop 'continuing', you've decided to stop living. This decision doesn't affect just you now. Now this affects your parents, sister, brother, friends. It gets to people who see you on the bus everyday. That lady at the bookstore who smiles at you when you come in every week. It's the friend that you sit next to in class. How do you decide to take yourself away from them? And if you do decide to do so... how do you know that things weren't going to get better? What if you kill yourself, and the next day you were going to sit in class and something would happen that would have changed everything?

Start. Continue.

[end]

Sunday, February 7, 2010

Naive

It's been a while. Sorry about that. Got caught up in a lot of different things.

So today's word is "Naive." Naive is a adjective with four meanings. 1]having or showing unaffected simplicity of nature or absence of artificiality; unsophisticated; ingenuous. 2] having or showing a lack of experience, judgment, or information; credulous. 3] having or marked by a simple, unaffectedly direct style reflecting little or no formal training or technique and 4] not having previously been the subject of a scientific experiment, as an animal.

So I've realized that I am naive. I am naive to many things that I was under the impression that I was well versed in. I am naive to relationships, romantic and otherwise. I am naive to how I act, and the mental workings of others. I am naive.

Naive is an attribute of the first Tarot card, The fool. He looks up at the sky whilst he should be looking where he's walking. He represents new experiences, and infinite possibilities. He also represents caution to the future, and is a warning card that tells you to stop daydreaming and get your head out of the clouds. He is naive to the snake, the cliff, the many depictions of pitfalls that he may be subject to.

I often wonder if naivety is innocence or if it's stupidity. If you are shown the worst of someone, and still believe them to be a good person, are you stupid? Innocent? A good person? Or are you just ignorant? The first definition of "Naive" says that being thus means you're unsophisticated. I wouldn't consider myself an unsophisticated person. I go to college, and I do pretty well. I read wonderful books, and understand words that some people don't. I am by no means a genius, but I am educated, and polite. I can voice my opinion, and I can reason with people. I have good manners, and friends that can vouch for my character. Yet I am naive.

Is naivety something you can outgrow? Is it implanted in your brain as something that you will always be? I always give people another chance. I have been stepped on, yelled at, hated, and worse, and in the end, I always give people another chance. Am I naive to think that talking things out can change things? Am I naive to say that it wont happen again?

What about the wrongs I've done to others? I am convinced that once I know a fault about myself, it's something I can and will change. It wont be easy, but I have faith that I can and will do it. Is it naive of me to think that I can even when I think others cant? Is it stupid of me to give others a chance and not give myself one?

I question frequently the things I write. I have an idea, and I start. I type my thoughts, and ponder them. You, as my reader, experience the progression of my thoughts, my stream of consciousness. Am I naive to think that getting my thoughts out there even matters to you? I've gone back and read things I've written and realized that sometimes, I don't even state my opinion, I just ponder what things are and why.

Naive. Why is naivety associated with stupidity? Is it really stupid to believe in the best of people?