Sunday, October 29

Stuck?

I was crazy sick for weeks, and in the time since I've felt... like my life is sort of stuck in the doldrums. I enjoy my ward, but I find that I feel disconnected (likely because I need to make a bigger effort on my own part). I enjoy my work at Soap Factory, but I don't really have any long-term, or even short-term goals professionally. My friendships are stable. My family is following a sort-of-vegan diet. My health is good.

So which way do I go from here?

I guess that depends on where I want to get.

Ultimately, I want to get to Heaven. And I want to take as many people with me as I can.

There's an infinite number of ways to make that happen. But what is something *I* can do? Something I can enjoy? Something where I can actually feel like I am making a difference? 

Enter the issue that likely I am facing, and that I feel like I've been facing for months now: I look at people with new jobs, people who leave on missions, people who go to school and begin new careers - people who all seem to have at least some direction in their lives - while I feel I lack that same direction in my own.

In my own defense, I feel like I've tried to find my own direction.

Or at least thought about it.

I've thought about getting a PhD or finding another Masters program. Moving someplace far away that would force me into something new. Going to a different ward. Finding a random 9-5 job. Finding, doing something, anything to pull me from the rut that feels my current existence.

But I can't transfer my records to a different ward because the moment I actually begin to make the choice, God tells me He wants me here. He wants me to make a difference in my ward, now. So maybe I'll just attend another ward in the morning.

I can't move far away because there are people in my life who need me here. I'm not sure that God would even let me move a couple miles.

There is one idea that is compelling to me...

One that is both scary and compelling.

I'm pretty sure I've written about it before. I love to design new ideas, new processes, new things. Finding a place, or creating a place, where I can design and create would be a dream come true. That's the compelling part.

The scary part? All of those ideas, in order to actually be worth anything more than a conversation, will require skill sets far beyond my own personal ability. And while working with an awesome team is a dream come true, putting a team together sounds only a little less painful than a literal trip to the infernal depths.

...

Perhaps *that* is why I feel so deeply discontent with the status quo, and why I also feel that God has been far too quiet in the matter. Because He has already given me a direction. One that I want to go, but one that distresses and scares me.

Well...

That does answer the question I came to this post with. It gives me direction anew, even if it seems honestly overwhelming.

Sometimes I dislike when blog posts go around in different directions than I expect them to. This post, for example, started with a decent feel to it, but the end feels far too... boring.

But does that mean it's less meaningful? Maybe. But I know there are plenty of times I've wished that Mormon had included more about the perfect society after the coming of Christ, rather than simply telling us that hundreds of years passed without controversy. Maybe, in the same way, the points of life that seem less meaningful and even boring to me, might be meaningful to someone else.

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