Keeping the ennui at bay

Happy new year everyone! Last time I posted it was Christmas day and I wrote about how Christmas day didn't really feel like Christmas. To be honest, there probably won't be another period in my life where I feel as "at one" with the Christmas spirit as when I was in high school and would spend a whole week  rehearsing Christmas carols for the annual carols at St Paul's Cathedral. 

By day four of carols rehearsals I would usually wake up having dreamt of carols, and I'll never forget walking down the aisle of St Paul's with a candle while we sang "Once in Royal", or singing "Of the Father's Heart Begotten" - the carol with a million verses (each one ending "evermore and evermore") that went on forever because that was the song where the money baskets would be passed along the whole congregation for collection.

I hope everyone has had a lovely start to the new year. Brendan and I spent a few days in Adelaide and went to some quiet beaches, a beautiful winery and wandered around Adelaide's sandstone-house lined streets.

We also watched all the Star Wars episodes from 1 to 9 - I love doing these sorts of movie marathons. 

This week I went back to work and it's been tricky, new, energy-sapping, energy-reviving etc. I can see myself thriving in this place, I can also see myself not really wanting to do all the things that my boss does. I think after so long, I've become much better at being much more comfortable starting a new job. Whether good or bad, I think it's right that I've got something new happening in my life.

Without study, I feel like my free time has become a lot more aimless even though it's opened up a lot of windows for me to see my friends. I don't think I'm the only person struggling with this - but sometimes I feel that I have to fight to keep the ennui at bay.

I was at a wedding last night and got asked a lot of questions about when I would be moving into my new place and when am I planning to get married. But my life is so much more than graduate from study --> get a new job --> buy my own place --> get married --> have children --> health problems --> retire --> die. I jokingly wondered whether all of my friends in 15 years' time would be asking me when I was planning to divorce.

I know that these are the celebrated milestones of the standard adult life, but all this stuff is in the background of my passions, motivations and beliefs. If I think of my life as a series of expected milestones that I should be completing at certain ages then I immediately feel a sense of hopelessness, melancholy, disinterest and ennui. Like my life is just a series of events that other people have said I should be doing and I lack the agency to assert my own passions. Maybe people are genuinely interested in what colour couch I'm going to be getting, but it's such a tiny part of who I am. Do they care? Because I most certainly do not. There are things that drive me and they have nothing to do with interior decorating. I also note that no one has asked Brendan the same questions.

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Most people don't have that many things that they strongly believe in and I think that's ok as long as you believe in yourself enough to go wherever the tides take you. A lot of people end up feeling lost though, and when life takes a rough turn they suddenly feel miserable without knowing why. But more often than not the "why" is because earlier in their life they relinquished their own agency and took the path of least resistance without forcing themselves to make a choice about what will make them happier, or what sort of person they want to be. 

I spoke to several people this week who had either been through a period of being "lost", are currently lost or showing very promising signs that if they're not careful they will be lost in the future.

Don't wait until you hate your own life. Don't wait until you start blaming the people around you for letting you take the path of least resistance. Always know why you're doing something and most importantly, take the time to get to know yourself. Be kind and compassionate.