The best way to travel in time is to fall asleep.
I have heard people saying their dream life is to quit work and get a life filled with leisure. Play all day, binge-watch TV, and eat whatever they want.
I had that life for a little while. Back then I gave a brother of mine a loan and I could live out the interest. Not a brutal one, just 10%. And that’s what I did. I played and played and played. World of Warcraft, chatting online, chasing emotions in the peace of my own home. But it turns out that phase of my life is the part I have fewer memories from. In my mind, it is like I traveled in time to where I put an end to it the moment I started looking inwards and noticed I had been running fast from the pain inside of me.
Years later I know better. When you see someone just distracting himself even 70% of the time is because it’s running from something. Trying not to see something right on his face.
You know what I remember the most? The moment I planned to face all my fears. For some reason, I had more anxieties than most and also depression. All that time I used trying to cope with my internal situation distracting myself. I barely remember, but the steps I used and traveled to construct myself. The failings. The victories. To my mind, it is like I was born 7 years ago.
A fulfilled life takes work to build. Takes pain. Why? Because it matters and there’s a stake. Emotional. Deep cuts.
Hopefully, I am not persuading you to step off the rail. But the other way around because even though it is frightening it’s also extremely rewarding looking back and feeling in yourself what you left behind. Bad habits, fears, things you said in the past “I am not made for that” and today you did them, and easily because you practiced it and you went through it without backing down.
So this is the message.
Live with intent. Notice how every second is an opportunity to be better or to try again, and make the world a better place.
This, to me, is to be happy. And very hard to forget!
Thank you for reading.
Constantino.
