No Choice
It's a lot. I guess that it does not have to be this way. I can choose. And I have chosen to try to improve quite a few different parts of my life. And it's a lot. And it is constant work. I have asked this question before and will probably ask it again and again until I can answer it properly.
What is it for? All of this work, what does it serve? Could it be that this is what it is? That all there is for me is just the work. I mean, if it is indeed that, then I guess that it would be fine. There are worst things in the world. But something is telling me that there should be something more.
Do I dare take the risk to enjoy something more? Am I willing to invest the time into enjoying something more, something that has no point other than the enjoyment? Am I willing to take the risk? It would be completely safe to decide not to have a point to all of the work. Succeed or not, at least I would know that I did not "waste" any time at all.
But then there is something else. I am going to die. I am over 50, so the odds that I am going to die have increased. I am going to die. Most days go by doing these normal things, almost in an unending blandness. And we live like that ignoring the fact that we are going to die, completely unaware that we have moved one step closer to our death.
That is something. That's no joke. That's not some odd or strange philosophy. That's truth. That's a function of life. Ideally, shouldn't that determine everything else? Actually, it should.
Maybe that is all the reason that I need. And maybe the answer to that question of "what is it all for?", at least the one that I can come up with for now, is to create art. Art for the sake of art. No goal, no self-improvement, just art.
While I am trying to gain muscle. While I am trying to rebuild course revenue. While I am trying to create more robust income streams. While I am making the time to read in order to not be uninteresting. While I am engaging in struggle, still taking the time to create art. Poetry, prose, and whatever else.
Maybe it's as simple as this ... If I am going to die and I have no choice in that, then I have no choice as well than to create art. And maybe art is the key, the answer, to finally soothing my soul, to me finding some of the peace I am looking for.
Well that's a hell of a truth isn't it? It truly is.