Refuse To Go Quietly Into The Night

It's funny how life works eh? And by that I mean the timing of things... I woke up this morning feeling unfulfilled - not depressed exactly, certainly not having a crisis moment or anything like that, just unfulfilled and a tad lost.

I suppose this feeling has been triggered by me reflecting on what my next challenge needs to be. I've been back in Canada for over a year now and have certainly re-established a life and a career once again. I am living in a new area while keeping my ties with my family and friends, etc... But - I do not want to settle back into a ''safe, comfortable, sleep-walking" state - that I did for so many years up in Ottawa - don't want to go back to that life.

And so this stuff was lightly rattling around my head as I was flipping channels and caught something unusual on the biography channel. I say unusual as it was not a biography. It was a man in front of an audience talking about life. The show was entitled - "5 things to do before you die". On any usual day, this would certainly interest me, but on this particular morning with my "lostness", I was very engaged.

He talked about a lot of good stuff, as you can well imagine but the one that struck me, was an exercise to write down 5 words you want the rest of your life to represent.

So ok, I'm game, I'm certainly in that space... For what it's worth, here are 5 words that came to me quite quickly this AM...

Silence
Permission
God
Glee
Risk

So why are these words important to me?

Silence

You know, I always have the TV on, or the radio or music from the Internet. Silence means I am listening to nothing, that I'm not distracted from the most important things in my life – me. There is much truth in silence. I also realize that I don't do this often enough because in silence you don't always like what you're hearing.

Permission

My whole life has been looking for permission. Whether it is from family (dead and alive), friends, bosses, god, psychics, therapists, strangers, society - I mean everyone. This is something I've known about myself for years - it stems from me being afraid, in some cases just terrified, of making mistakes and letting everyone around me seize the opportunity to shame me. I have given those around me way too much permission to do this to me. My mistakes are mine and mine alone. I own them and am damn proud of 'em all, they represent trophies of living my life. And they are none of your business.

God

My continual and constant struggle with my spirituality, facing my mortality, seeking reasons for being on this earth for this life. I will never stop asking this question.

Glee

This word came from my stand up comedy experience. It was uttered by my instructor the first time he saw me perform my own material. He said - "there is a nice glee about you". I like the word very much – it represents to me humour, honesty, a very natural and child-like emotion and happiness.

Risk

My buzz word for living my life. If I'm not risking anything, I'm not living my life. This four letter word brings out so much passion and excitement in me. It says to me: I refuse to go quietly into the night!