Ten years. A meaningless, arbitrary milestone, but for one who pines for something more, who is not altogether satisfied, a decade ought to serve as a wake up call, a reminder that a person only gets a few decades’ worth of career/adult life, and one has already been spent, and if nothing changes, another will soon pass in the same way.
It should be a wake up call, but I am groggy, if awake at all. As much as I want to wake up, I am still totally involved in the dream. I am Dorothy, clicking my heels, but nothing is happening. It seems obvious from the outside that I should do this or try that, but the opinions of others ring hollow, feel flimsy, because they are based on my own false projections of myself onto the world. I feel the answer must come from somewhere deep within, but it is hidden from me, and I don’t know how to begin looking for it.
I am trying to listen. Over the past two years, I have been systematically turning down the volume on my life—gracefully removing myself from responsibilities, cutting fruitless ties, unsubscribing, turning on Do Not Disturb—and the resulting silence remains empty.
My life is coming to a grinding halt, and I find a certain kind of satisfaction in that (I abhor busyness), but it also strikes terror into my heart. I can feel the loss of velocity almost as though I were literally coming to a stop. The diversity of diversions in my former life gave me a sense of being interesting. Without the velocity, the diversity, I am left with myself. And what if I am nothing if not moving?
I have exited the rat race but I still think like a rat.