"It Happens to All of Us" [Wendy]

I've had the habit of writing in notebooks and practice writing meditation ever since Dr. C's class in 2008. Yet, I move around a lot, and cannot take all those notebooks with me. When my parents sold their house in St. Louis last year, I decided to digitize all of the notebooks that I've stored in their basement. I take pictures of each page and save them onto Day One, a diary app. 

Last month, in preparation for moving out of Saigon and back to Taiwan, I once again was taking photos of the notebooks that I had with me. I want to share this particular prompt from one of Dr. C's previous classes. I believe this was in the fall of 2018, during my year of full-time travel. (And one of the many classes I didn't follow through... 😅

I love re-reading old entries and love the feeling of reading about my own thoughts from a third-person perspective (since I've long forgotten to have written these words). This writing reflected so much angst that I was feeling while I was "living the dream" to travel the world. 

It Happens to All of Us

In the end, we all end the same way. I dunno when I came to this realization, but lately that has been my guiding post in how I live my life. If we all will end the same, then I want to ensure I don't live the same life as everyone else.

Societal pressure happens to all of us as well. The good education, good job, big house, good school district for our kids, etc. Breaking away from it all isn't as easy as one may think. There is always that slight anxiety of, "am I making a mistake?!"

I often ask myself how I'm contributing to the world? Now that I'm free from the golden handcuff, how can I position myself in this world where I'm making a contribution to the human race, to the environment?

It happens to all of us. One day, at an undetermined time and place, our bodies will cease to function. That day can be 70 years from now or tomorrow. None of us has control over that timing. 

What we do have control over is the way that we decide to spend each and every day. What does "living your best life" look like? We will all end the same way one day, but we don't always ask this question.