“Life, it’s a process.”

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I hear this a lot, about how life is a process. Yes, sure I get it. We are born, we grow some feet, gain a few pounds, we learn curse words and go through high school. At that point, most of us make our first big life decision. College? Job? Drugs? Nothing? Point is, we do something. We make a conscious decision about which direction to head. Or we make a conscious decision not to decide which direction to head. Whatever, something happens.

The next few years go by fast, and it’s some of the most fun we’ve ever had. Truckloads of booze, dirty, untamed sex, experimentation, building a new identity. We somehow make it through the class with an average score. Get a diploma, and again, make a life decision. Am I going to take a corporate job with steady pay? Am I going to do drugs? Am I going to not use anything I just paid for? Am I go to be an artist? A writer? A hooker? Am I going to spend my remaining student loan to buy that bike? Hopefully.

Well, unfortunately a lot of us (maybe not you) make the indicative decision to “grow up” and start developing our blasé self, or as I like to say, we begin preparing for death. Retirement plans, broccoli, Cadillacs, you know, that boring grown up type of shit. Convinced by our high school elders that we are taking the right path, we grind it out for a few years. The pay is good, the benefits, the company car, the whole nine yards, it’s all good. Wife, kids, house, you name it, this is how it’s supposed to be. Neighbors are cool, we grill out sometimes. The Friday night unwind to some light beer and Bruce Springsteen. Bruce. Fucking. Springsteen. Fuck yea, look at the fish jumping in that pond.

All of a sudden you approach a break in the road, and there’s only one way to cross it. “What the hell is this? Where am I going?” Well, at that point, the mid-life crisis, you make a rash decision to quit your day job and start down a new path in something you’re passionate about. Because what else is the point right? But it’s too late. You’ve been unconsciously spinning your wheels for the past 45 years and all you’re about to do is change the tires. Except this time, the tread wears faster. You might get a couple good years, but soon enough, you’ll be stuck again, just spinning your tires. Asking once more, “What the hell is this?” You’ll be stuck riding the indoor trainers of your mind. Literally going nowhere. Just spinning your tires day in and day out. Unsatisfied because of the “life process.”

This all is nothing new of course, so what’s the point? There are periods in life when it all just seems like is a big burnout contest, where the majority of your time is pent up in a cloud of mundane smog. But even if all you’re doing each day is spinning tires, it doesn’t have to suck. So go make it not suck. This guy did..

#fyf

“Write drunk, edit sober.” – Ernest Hemingway

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