I am not usually the person who suggests one find inspiration in literature. But part of this thread has reminded me of Georges Perec's "Life, a User's Manual". the protagonist of which must find some way to spend his life, having inherited a small fortune at a young age. He settles upon a scheme where he creates, solves, then destroys jigsaw puzzles, a plan which is rudely interrupted by reality. Though I'm afraid this is not helpful advice. Best of luck,
On Wed, Sep 18, 2019 at 10:08 AM michael coyote michaelguldan@gmail.com wrote:
Same here, Joseph. I often felt like a puzzle piece for a puzzle that doesn’t exist and still sometimes do..
I think that as others have pointed out, travel can be good for lending you perspective and Seeing your own life in a way you haven’t. If you can swing it, try to do it for an extended period of time as your professional, personal and family obligations allow.
I’m not sure if anyone has mentioned it yet, but therapy helped to give me the tools to deal with a lot of BS on my own.. I also recommend this if you can swing it. I’d also say that dealing with death and responsibility at a young age might also be good to sort through with the help of counseling. I’d also like to add that if you think you might be depressed (it’s not always self-apparent), do talk to someone about it.
Finding a direction in life is a tough thing to do and everyone needs to do it on their own, and while letting the wind blow you where it may is an option, but I feel it’s good to have some general goals about what you want out of life even if they’re small.. That said it sounds like you are used to some challenge and are looking for more of that. This time though no-one is handing you a challenge. This is the moment your whole life has been building up to and it sounds like you’re in a bit of a “well now what “ moment.. The challenge for you is to create your next challenge. Maybe you have a book or three in you waiting to get out, or maybe you’re looking for a new career and you haven’t realized it yet.
Luckily though you have a lot of the tools realize this and figure this out. Take as much time for yourself as you can and document your thinking and empty it out onto a page somewhere. Travel as you can. Even if it’s a week in the country with a backpack or couch surfing for a few weeks. Talk to people, get their perspectives and broaden your own.
I think you got this. <3
_michael
On September 17, 2019 at 3:09:57 PM, Joseph Rooks (josephrooks@gmail.com) wrote:
Hey ~ clubbers, this is a weird one, but I also feel like I’m among fairly self-aware people here, many I am familiar with and respect, and many others who are the kind of people who would be on this list to begin with.
I doubt the question I’m posing will be lost on you. And if it goes unanswered, well, I know it’s a pretty expansive and personal question. Maybe some of you will find it relevant, maybe you won’t. At the heart of the issue is my love of making things, and finding myself with no direction that leads me toward doing so.
Think that’s enough self-conscious sandbagging to cover the bases.
I’m 33 and I’ve been self-employed as a writer for most of my adult life. I stuck with it because circumstances demanded it – I’ve dealt with a lot of weirdly evenly spaced deaths in my family, been an estate executor twice, and now I am the last of my kind. I’m good at what I do, I negotiate and organize like nobody’s business, I work hard, I’ve got intensity and grit, I am dead calm in any storm. All things I learned from being executor of two estates at 19 while attending school full time.
The problem is, I no longer know what to do with any of that. Life quieted down so much after fifteen years of utter chaos, and now I’m incredibly aware of the fact that I’ve got nowhere to go back to and nowhere I’m expected to show up. I feel like a ship without a rudder, just drifting around without any direction, on a sea that’s gone calm for the first time I can remember.
It’s got me thinking of what all of the energy I used on tragedy could go toward. How I might be even better at my work. It’s got me thinking about taking a full time job somewhere I can mitigate chaos and make life easier for others besides myself. It’s got me thinking about going off to some foreign country for a few years. I don’t know. I’ve just started taking really crazy shots in the dark lately to try to find new things I could say yes to, but I don’t have any real sense of direction.
I don’t know if there’s an “answer” that makes this adrift, dislodged, floating feeling go away, but I need to find some new way forward now that it seems none of the old rules that I’m used to apply anymore.
If you’ve felt anything like this before, how’d you deal with it?