When people ask me what it is I do in life, I very often struggle to give a clear, satisfactory answer. It is not because I do not know what I am doing with my life, but because I cannot answer in a way that will satisfy the one who asks. That can be slightly frustrating at times, as I leave myself open to judgment by others, and more often than not, the final opinion that people have of me is not very favorable. A has-been, a hopeless case, a badly-brought up child, lost in the wilderness... the list goes on and on.
Many of my family members firmly believe that I should be doing something else. I am told that I am wasting my time. However, when I ask them what I should rather be doing, they never give me a proper reply. Well, at least nothing more than a superficial answer; I should be trying for a good univeristy, I should get a strong medical degree, I should be aiming to get a good job and make lots of money... Wonderful dreams that many parents would harbor for their children. Yet, why is it that something deep within me just is not able to accept this? Why is there this nagging voice inside me that says that there is more to life than what I have been told?
What is it to be human? What is it to be a person? I am neither wise enough nor foolish enough to propose answer to these questions, but for what it is worth, I have something to say, nonetheless. What is it to be human? I have this body, this persona, that allows me to... act. Motion is one certainty, at least to me, that I possess, or at least, am capable of. Feelings, both physical and spiritual, subtle and shocking, painful and pleasurable, are these certainties. Yet, what does it all mean? Why must I feel these things that give me the knowledge, this notion, of humanity? Why and how must I live with the knowledge of my inevitable death? As far as I can tell, that is what it means to be human.
In that sense, I might now try to answer the person who asks about what I am doing with my life by saying that I am attempting to figure out what to do with these knowledge that I have of my humanity. Hence, I am trying to deal with my emotions, my thoughts and also the knowledge of my mortality. I could say that... but what would be the point? What would I get in return? Blank stares? Those are actually pretty mild. I am more likely to be told to get a life... literally. So I guess we can forget about that answer.
What is it to be a person? I am told that we are social creatures and that our personalities are actually reflections of peoples' perceptions of ourselves. Is that what we are as far as personalities go, simply elaborate masks that we adorn among each other for the sake of... I do not know. To my knowledge, a person is defined by their relationships, or, in other words, the bonds they form with those around them. What kind of person I am is the result of the conditions of my relationships. Therefore, perhaps I should be concentrating on maintaining strong relationships?
Is this what I should tell the person who asks what I am doing with my life? That I am on a mission to find true love, where I can help form a truly incorruptible relationship so I may have the right personality? Again, what would this elicit from the one who asks? It is certainly not the answer they were looking for... but it is all I can give.
I relaise that we all have choices to make in life. We are both victims of consequence as well as creatures of free will, for the power to decide is invested in us, in my humble opinion. One of the biggest choices we have to make is how to live our lives; should we life for ourselves or should we live for everything else? That question, to me, is the ultimate one. It means something different to each and every one of us, which in itself explains our differences of opinions.
I may have chosen to live for myself, which is what I am told so often to be the sensible and practical thing to do, for we all need to survive. Survival in a rough world is the priority and we should take care of our interests. The problem with this, for me, is that I have lost the ability to see the world and me as being separate. I do not know how others do it, but I cannot see 'myself' as a individual and independant entity any longer. You can see how this leads to my dilemma, for I no longer see a reason to care about my own interests. There are none. However, as part of this existence, I see a coherence, a pattern, and a rythm in everything that tells me none of are anything without one another. We are, in every single way, attached to this reality, this plane of existence. There is no you and me...there is just this. Hence, I see no purpose to live for myself, but I find every reason to live for everything else, because everything else and me are pretty much the same thing.
So maybe this is what I should say to the one who asks what I am doing with my life; that I am living for others, helping the helpless, protecting the weak, trying to preserve hope for those who are losing it while keeping a little for myself and always looking out for the everything around me rather than worrying about which univeristy I get into or what degree I get or how much my job pays. Again, is this a good answer to give the one who asks?
The truth is, I am all these things... this is what I feel I should be doing with my life. I do not know if it is truly right or wrong, but I do know that it feels right. So why do I till get judged so badly by others, especially those who claim to understand me well?
This is the one reason why it is so much more easier to just say I am in college studying for a degree.

Hello again...

Well, the busiest semester of my life is finally over now. It ended two days ago, when I sat for and completed my American Governement paper. Despite the heavy, unrelenting schedule, I think I did pretty well in all my subjects. It was tough and the workload was immense, mostly due to the semester being so short and me having taken four heavy subjects. Even so, I am slightly disappointed that it is all over. Honestly, I've never had so much fun learning in school as much as I did these past three months or so. It was quite an amazing experience.
Philosphy. Philosophy. What a truly enlightening subject. Just two months of Philosophy was enough to make me believe that nothing else is remotely as important. I did a somersault towards the end of the semester when I decided to become a Philosophy major, much to most peoples' absolute alarm. I love it, I love the subject.
It is not anything new, actually,my interest in philosophy. I have always been interested in asking big, deep questions about life and reality, just never seriously enough to want to make it my life. Then I realized that these questions are the most important things in life. I want to figure out my purpose in this exstence. Even if I don't succeed, I would like to at least try.
I'll continue this tomorow. Need to get some shut eye.