byluke.com

It’s a shame. I think I’ve lost faith in the magic. Countless first dates, relationships with short fuses, gift horses with agendas. I’m tired and I’ve stopped believing. I’ve grown up and somewhere there is a fairy dying. So there Peter Pan complex!

Two and a half years ago I ended my relationship with one of my best friends. For everything we had we worked better as best friends, not partners. Ending that relationship shook my life to the core, changing my hopes, dreams and ambitions. By 21 I’d had a job in my own studio and I was a great Mac trainer. I’d pretty much crossed off everything on the to-do list. I remember our first (and only) work Christmas party. I was asked by the wife of our investor who my heroes were. Who I looked up to. I didn’t have an answer for her and I still don’t have an answer today. I know my life has purpose, I just don’t know what it is (yet).

It (life) has all just become too mechanical. Too constructed. To quote Aladdin "Gotta eat to live, gotta steal to eat". Well I don’t steal, but I have countless hours stolen from me. I allow it under the guise of gaining new skills, but I really strive somewhere between self-created bedlam and bureaucracy. Too much of one or the other and the scales will tip. I’m striving to find balance, and I’m yet to give up hope that I can find balance and peace regardless of my environs, I just need to accept that these will be internal balance and peace. It’s not always possible to create that externally too, at least to the extent I’d consider reasonable.

I meet new people every day. Some of them come into my store at work, some of them I chat to online and we opt to have a coffee. And yet for all the people I meet, I’ve come to a degree of acceptance I’m not going to find what I’m looking for. In fact I’ve managed to obfuscate what I’m looking for to such an extent that not even I remember what I’m searching for. So I accept it. I won’t find what I’m looking for. I’m not ready to settle down. I’m only 23. But in doing that am I cutting things short? Am I sentencing myself to a life devoid of commitment? Perhaps I am.

I had a magical dream about 3 weeks ago. I was living in this house at the bottom of a shallow valley, surrounded by undulating hills. On closer inspection the house was made of grass, growing in and out, forming the walls like a hedge, but grass. I was exploring the house and there was a really big room for me and each of my flatmates. As I continued to explore I found a old door, which opened to an old world style study. Gorgeous windows, an entire wall of books and an amazing desk. I awoke shortly thereafter but ever since have felt empty, questioning why I can’t find such a warm, inviting, productive space. I hope to not always need the physical construct but until I can learn how to put myself in the zone, it no doubt helps.

And so I sit here. Typing. Chatting. Thinking. Listening to Staind tell me that "It’s been a little while since I could look at myself straight… hold my head up high". One of my new friends has just told me that I need to allow myself to be spoiled a bit. Allow myself to have someone surprise me with coffee, plans for the evening, or something little to make me smile.

A lot has changed in a relatively short space of time. I’m more outgoing. I don’t shrink away when I catch my reflection. I like (most) of my body. And yet I sit back and look at all the areas I can improve on. It’s relentless. I see everything as some sort of list I need to check things off of. And I’m tired. Tired of dreaming up new things to write on it.

I need this story to write itself. I need to know why I’m here. Because the world isn’t enough.

ED: Apologies… there isn’t much sense in this consciousness stream despite my efforts to edit it.