We sat over lobster mac & cheese and listed out our goals & dreams for the rest of the year like they were players on a roster. Just waiting to get off the bench.
I sighed audibly into my heirloom tomatoes, and confessed to feeling Angsty. Agitated. Stuck. I jabbed my fork at the cheese covered cavatelli and said a little quieter and to no one in particular...
I just don't want to get on this track of ticking off a list of things you're supposed to do in this industry to be successful because that's the way it's always been done. The way that everyone else has already done it. I don't want to play that game, because I know from experience that's a game that nobody wins. And whatever we do....I want it to be ours. I just don't want to wake up one day and find myself stuck, deep in the ruts of a path that someone else has already carved.
I breathed deeply, and a little easier. Lifted of the burden from just having said the words out loud.
And I let the quiet that followed as we all paused to think about this a little longer, sink in and wrap around everything in the room.
The silence was finally broken by Ryan, who looked me straight in the eye and asked, Well, I guess the question is, at what point in that process, in that list of goals that you have, do you think you'll ever feel satisfied?
I slapped my hand down on the table and laughed a little louder than the space would allow. That's the thing. I will NEVER feel satisfied. I know that. On my death bed I will probably be pushing to do just a little bit more before I head off into that bright white light.That's just who I am and I'm ok with that.
At this, Justin nodded his head and "mmmmm-hmmmm'd" like a Southerm Baptist minister's wife waving a hankie in the air. That's it. She is speaking the truth. That is the ONLY thing she could have said right there that would have been true
I went on.
But the thing is, what I don't want is to do something just because I think it's what I'm supposed to do or what everyone else is doing. Because that way, it will never really be mine. I want to do it because I love it. Because it speaks to me. Because it sets my heart and my hair on fire. Because it's something I can build a life on. Something that leaves this world a little better place than I found it. And something that on that death bed... I know I can be proud of.
I don't want to be just another flash in the pan. One of those people in this world who races to the end to see if they can be the fastest, only to get there and realize that they never really knew what they were running toward.
Last night we met up with our friends Liz & Ryan to plan out and dream for the rest of 120 or so days left in this year. And then afterwards we took in an Orioles game, where one Mr. Cal Ripken was being honored. This is a man who built a career on doing what he loved, integrity, longevity, and going the distance. In not being known as the fastest, but the one with the most heart.
And in both cases, I was thankful for the reminder.
Life with J&M
