Childhood Lost
Hunting. Fishing. Trading baseball cards. Sports. Video games. These were all staples of my youth, and everyone of these things, while childish in nature are making many people millions of dollars a year.
We tend to think that as we get older that it is sensible to shed particular ideas, attitudes, and interests. Well, if our modern world has proven anything to us, it's the fact that you can make a living doing just about anything.
Who would have thought even 20 years ago that people would make millions of dollars opening and playing with toys online, that people would be playing video games in stadiums, people becoming celebrities by being an outdoorsman or any number of 'childish' acts played out in an adult world?
Those people that have carved out a unique living for themselves, doing exactly what they want, have all inevitably faced some hardship or struggle along the way. The struggle was welcome though, possibly not even perceived as hardship, because it was in the pursuit of chasing joy, of chasing honest to God passion.
The more typical scenario in the modern-day world is one, where we shed our childhood skin like a molting snake and assume the role of 'creating income.' We give ourselves all sorts of excuses or vices to maintain our directive of work and consumption, such as family, houses, cars, a better future. What happens later is discontent, a feeling of being trapped, and then a blue-faced breath hold while waiting for the retirement finish line. Once, the so-called 'golden years' of retirement are upon us. We see that people spend most of their time taking care of the things they accumulated along that path and quite possibly patching back together all the other crucial aspects of their life, namely spiritual, health, family and friends.
Why is it commonplace to sacrifice so many things that are sacred to being truly human, to live a life that is determined by society at large? Why are we so uncomfortable or unfamiliar with figuring out what WE want, and then pursuing that wholeheartedly.
Our lives, for better or worse, are now ruled by technology. Our ability to recognize our self-identity only becomes more difficult as social media and media at large, create images that we blindly purse to obtain an idealized and often false perception of happiness.
My suggestion, ask yourself what you did as a child. What truly brought you joy. What consumed your thoughts. It's not always an activity or hobby. It could be a feeling. It could be an idea. You could find out that you were raised in an environment that didn't expose you to much at all, so you never had the opportunity to find out 'who you are.'
Well, the time is now. Attempt. Explore. Do. Live.
We don't need a better economy, a better country, or a better world. We need a better YOU. Those constructs will happen when we start to live our truest life.
