soapboxdiner

What happens when I attend one Joyce Meyer seminar and read In Search of Zarathustra

Life is so complicated, isn't it darlings? Busy busy busy, want want want. Too much money, not enough time. Too much ambition, too much stress. Wanna get here, but is the hustle gonna get you there, and what about just a little fun in the middle? Go baby, go. Don't stop now.

And it's funny. Youth is all about expectations, hope, and the steady stream of disappointments that lead you to an understanding that you are probably never going to have it all. But that doesn't mean that you don't want it all.

I have a girlfriend who's been single for over a decade. She claims she's OK with that - that it doesn't bother her. And yet, every conversation we have inevitably circles around to how her life would be so much more if there was a good man in it. Recently she's been dating a good man - but he works two jobs (as does she). He makes her very happy when they are together. But he doesn't have the time she feels she deserves, and so she walked away. Now she states quite emphatically that she's through with dating - again. Men suck. Blah blah.

And then there is me. I'm dating a man who is very sweet. He buys me flowers and gives me sweet compliments. He holds my hand as we sleep and kisses my forehead in the morning. He works roughly 60-70 hours a week and lives 40 miles away. He has a teenage daughter who he sees once a week and a mother he sees about the same. Thursday nights are boy's night, and that leaves roughly one night a week, between the hours of 9:00 p.m. and 5:00 a.m. for us to be together.

It's really not enough. I want so much more, but is that really fair? What part of that equation is within my possible realm of Right to ask him to forego in deference to me?

And that's the crux, isn't it? Of all the possible courses I could take with it, what is right and what would lead to happiness in the situation? I could nag and cry and be demanding.

I don't like to nag.

I could walk away and tell him our lifestyles are not compatible.

And I would be throwing out all the good with the little bit of bad that gives me discomfort.

A year ago I started a new position. The CEO and Director took me to lunch and asked me what my 5-year plan was. Where do you want to be, SBD?

I want to be a program manager, I said. I want to spearhead new employee development programs, I want to help others build their skills. I want opportunity to shine in intellectual arenas where a 12th-grade graduate doesn't rightly belong.

And one year later, I have been granted those opportunities. I have edited and revised technical procedural guides, developed and implemented online training and application processes, I have developed and taught seminars and written handbooks for improving efficiencies, and am responsible for orientation and training for all new-hires. I write for the quarterly newletter, coordinate inventory, troubleshoot equipment and software failures, and QC every employee on staff.

I haven't taken a day off in a month. I do not get paid for the overtime. I do it because I made a statement that I was smart and capable, and I wanted it - was driven to achieve the goals and take them to levels above their expectations.

It's just so funny, the things we think we want. Do we really want them, or do we just want what we think they represent? In the process of deciding where our desires lie, do we consider the sacrifices and consequences that accompany those desires?

Do you walk away because what you thought you wanted doesn't fit exactly into your prepackaged and shrunk-wrapped misconception of perfection? Or do you quietly accept the discomfort as an integral aspect of the greater satisfaction?

Do you decide that your ambitions and desires are too big? Do you humbly acknowledge that happiness is smaller that absolute greatness?

I have no grand philosophically composed answers of my own. Nietzsche said, "Values are the creation of human beings. One person's good is another's evil. None the less, we are all responsible for creating values for ourselves and for then living up to them. And the highest of all values is the duty to transcend ourselves, to struggle for the next step in our personal evolution [...] Though most will never achieve it, this self-overcoming, this "will to power," is the proper task of all human beings."

Happiness. Good. Evil. Desire. Ambition. Promises. Failures. Sacrifices and compromises. All these burdensome things ... It's too late to take any of it back now, I am committed.

I choose to accept the discomfort for the sake of the happiness. When you have had little, you understand the value of some.

Nietzsche has given us a huge task, and as he says, not all of us will succeed. I choose compassion for the struggles of others as they make the same journey I undertake.

And I think I've decided I do not like the word 'deserve'. It is a word wrought with pity and hewn with self-indulgence.

11:46 am - 05.11.08
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