What if you don’t want it?
A life well lived, from my estimation, is one filled with joy, satisfaction, love, and accomplishment derived of our truest passions.
What if you don’t want the life that society prescribes for you?
What if you don’t find romance and delight in making a baby together?
What if you don’t find the opposite sex appealing?
What if you don’t want to partake in holy matrimony?
Or if you just don’t want to host an opulent wedding?
What if you don’t want one partner, but many?
What if you want no partner at all?
For the most part, we are conditioned to believe that there is a way things are done: you get married, buy a house, have kids, raise kids, and those kids repeat the cycle.
Maybe you have the conditioning now that you also need to have a high-powered career.
On top of having the marriage, the house, the kids.
And you start to wonder…do I want that?
Did I want that?
Did I do that because I was conditioned to want that?
Do I not want that because they tried so hard to condition me to want that?
Conditioning is a wild monster. It is the very belief that from the time you are conceived – and frankly, even before – that someone else knows what paths and choices are better for you.
It is living life through SMART goals. Measurable, tangible acts that somehow indicate that you are living correctly and that, on your death bed, you will have lived a full life.
But…where is the joy?
Certainly if these are the things that you want, and you have found them in alignment with your soul, rather than the pressure you felt to achieve them by a certain age, you may experience great joy.
In all of these structures, amidst all of these life goals, there is no talk of self care. Of the hobby you have that fills up your cup, even if you spend only 3 minutes a day with it. There is no talk of emotional well being or mental health.
You’re not taught how to have a truly loving relationship with yourself, but by the time you’re 25 you’re expected to be settled down with the love of your life.
Have the kids before you’re 30 so that you can be done with them young enough to live your life.
What if you don’t want all of that?
What if you only want some of it?
Or none of it?
Well, pick up your hobby, practice your self care, find yourself a therapist, and go forth.
The pressure is heavy, the noise is loud, and the only way you can really determine what you want for your life is to push it off and block it out.
Get to know yourself. See what feels good in your body. What your heart longs for. And go forth to receive that. It won’t always be easy, but the trials and tribulations of creating your life are at least your trials and tribulations to experience.
A life well lived, from my estimation, is one filled with joy, satisfaction, love, and accomplishment derived of our truest passions.
Not the formula prescribed for us at birth.
