Beginnings of Change
Both my husband and I are on the brink of making major life changing decisions about where we live and how we live. For years we’ve longed to live in a place where there is a stronger sense of community and where work is considered something you do, not something you are. The problem is that we don’t know where that place is and we’re trying to also locate ourselves so that we’ll be close to our respective families. His is in the midwest while mine is in the southeast. The end result is that we’ve developed analysis paralysis.
The more we think about it, the more we come to the realization that we are looking for something that perhaps doesn’t exist. That is, our happiness may be totally unrelated to our surroundings. Sure, the environment in which we live has some impact on our overall state of well being, but there are other factors that contribute to our happiness. Maybe we’d feel just as isolated in a small town as we do in the city because the mindset of the locals doesn’t match ours. If we can’t connect to the people around us, does it matter that we have a single family home and land on which our kids can run around freely?
Job security plays into our difficulties as well. Small towns just don’t offer as many opportunities as cities. Truth is that I think a lot of people struggle with finding balance. There are probably more people that are unsatisfied in their jobs and in their lives than the opposite, more people who long for something more rewarding and personally satisfying, with less stress and isolation. Maybe it’s time to compare ourselves to the norm rather than the exception. I mean, I am not going to be a movie star or super model. Shouldn’t I stop comparing myself to them? That’s just a recipe for feeling really rotten about myself (though these days movie stars and super models don’t seem to have the best lives either, as countless numbers of them end up in rehab or jail or some other misadventure).
What, then, is our best solution, our best course of action? I don’t know. Not a very uplifting message, I know, but it’s the truth. Right now that’s as good as my answer gets. Either time will tell or it won’t.