Mechanical. Robotic. A conveyor belt. Feeding out desired responses.
Only now do I feel like I've been improvising, making it up as I go along. Like I've hit the ground running and can't stop. So I'm ducking and dodging so that I could keep up. Like I've been thrown into a 10 feet deep pool and I have to find different ways to stay alive.
First, it took being willing to learn to swim. It was a choice. I've always held myself back from even trying for fear of failure. But how else would I learn. I had to wash away all of my insecurities of others ridiculing me... and try. Then it was making sure I had a good floation device: support. One tricky thing about this was figuring out the flimsy ones from the sturdy ones. At first, everyone's smiling and laughing in your face. Masks painted on. As the tough times come and the waves pick up, the flimsy ones wither away, making you sink. Luckily the sturdy ones are always reliable.
Soon, however, you have to let go and swim: independence. Yes, your friends help you, but YOU are your major source of inspiration. No one else.
I've come to many points in my life where I've just stood still, waiting for life to get less hectic. I realize that this is impossible. Life will never be less hectic. You'll only be able to manage it more suffieciently. There were so many instances where I just wanted to drown. Why fight with the waves and high tides? Why not let them overtake you? It seems so easy to just sink to the bottom. It seems so natural. I thought about it a few times, wanting to just give up. That just wasn't a feasible option for me. So I've realized that sometimes you have to go in head-first, get right into it. Life is a lot of improvisation even though we're handed a script. Even though we were fed structures and templates. Even though we were molded and told who to be. It's about self discovery. That maybe, if you swim deep enough in the most dangerous depths of the ocean, you'll find the loveliest of pearls. The shinest of stones. So what else better to do but jump in.
