I Don’t Know What I Want
I don’t know what I want.
I want to love someone, yet I want to be free from any relationship headaches and attachment.
I want to be loved, but I’m afraid to open up.
I want to get married and have kids, yet I want to be free and do whatever without having responsibilities to anyone.
I want to travel the world, but I need to work to get money.
I want to be creative, yet I need to be realistic.
I want to make money, yet I don’t want to be trapped in a hustle culture.
I want to study global mental health, yet I want to understand business and investment.
I want to spread my wings and roam the world, but I don’t want to be away from family and friends.
I want to be a successful woman, yet I just want to live in the peaceful countryside somewhere.
I want to take another step, but I don’t want anything to change.
I want something more, but I long for contentment.
I want everything in the world, yet I want nothing.
I want to build a romantic relationship, yet I can’t trust anyone.
I want to be religious, yet I question everything.
I want to strive for my dreams, but I know everything is just temporary so is it worth it?
I want to do everything, but I want to do nothing.
I long for a journey, but I’m afraid of anything.
I don’t know what I want.
Since being a kid, I have always strived to be an individual who has a great career, being at the top of their workplace, going from meeting to meeting, and having a busy yet fulfilled life.
I know many people want to have a life like this. Getting a high position at their job, being respected, and hustling every day. But as I grew older, where I may get a little taste of how this lifestyle operates, I don’t know anymore if I still want it.
If we’re not doing something, that means we are wasting our time. If we’re not having busy days that means we are a failure. If we are not constantly producing something, that means we are worthless. But what about just simply live? Not racing to achieve extraordinary things just for the craving of validation from someone we barely even know? It all just a social constructs anyway.
Anxieties that come before exchanges, headaches from long meetings, unmet expectations, no balance nor boundaries. That picture of a busy, productive, hectic lifestyle shifts into a peaceful, mindful, and simple life.
Just living a normal mediocre life is an achievement and extraordinary in itself.
“If our lives are only preoccupied with our wandering and hunting for the meaning of life, then when do we live?” — Albert Camus.
“The meaning of life is just to be alive. It is so plain and so obvious and so simple. And yet, everybody rushes around in a great panic as if it were necessary to achieve something beyond themselves.” — Alan Watts.
“Storming a breach, conducting an embassy, ruling a nation are glittering deeds. Rebuking, laughing, buying, selling, loving, hating and living together gently and justly with your household — and with yourself — not getting slack nor being false to yourself, is something more remarkable, more rare and more difficult. Whatever people may say, such secluded lives sustain in that way duties which are at least as hard and as tense as those of other lives.” — Michel De Montaigne.
Maybe what we need is just to be content.
But I feel like a hypocrite.
