Still learning myself

There are times when I take an inventory of myself and wonder if I was somehow born into the wrong life. Am I walking down the wrong path? It seems like the things I like to do and the hobbies that I find myself engaging in do not line up with the end game goal that the path I have chosen for life arrives at. And then someone said something to me that made a whole lot more sense.


"Perhaps you are just discovering things about yourself. It's okay to have a hobby that has nothing to do with your career goals."


While it was a very common sense thing to say, that statement cleared up a whole lot. For years, I have had tunnel vision. I have only wanted one thing and have taken a steady course in order to get there. I never stopped for any side journeys along the way, even though I had a deep seated interests in a number of things. I believed that I was only good at a handful of things and there was no reason to expand beyond that. Stick with what you are good at and leave everything else to someone else. However, someone did one of the best things for me that could ever happen. They bought me a sketch book and some pencils.


"Just draw."


Like a gateway drug, that one action opened the floodgates to everything else that I had ever wanted to do, but denied myself the pleasure of doing because it didn't fit into the mold that I had made for myself. But now that I had started to indulge myself, I began to think myself strange. Why was it these things that brought me so much joy? It was as if my brain could not wrap itself around the fact that I could enjoy things that had nothing to do with each other. I always felt like I had to choose. That was until a few nights ago.


I suppose I thought I was too old to be discovering new things about myself. I had assumed that my time of discovery had passed and everything about me that needed knowing and finding out had already been done. But it is sort of exciting to think that I might have a few more things up my sleeve; a few more surprises that have yet to be seen. And they could be coming from places that I least expect.