I have struggled to become a more social person and that requires me to be a impulsive person. A person who can more easily take things as they come. Someone who more easily watches things happen instead of being someone who needs to be in the middle. This has come from the past number of years, where I was the opposite. After I came out of my deep period of seclusion I wanted to take part in everything. I need to be in the middle of whatever I could volunteer for. And I volunteered for everything. The problem was that I was at a place in my life where I could hardly hold my own life together, let alone follow through on the things I had said I would.
There are three major things in my life that really changed the way I followed through on things, because most of my life if I said I would do it, I did. 1. I volunteered to go to Iraq and volunteered for a second back to back tour. 2. I volunteered to be the durable power of attorney for my grandmother. 3. I volunteered to be the personal representative for my biological father’s estate. It’s not that I regret doing these things. It’s that people, people I trust told me not to do them. Remembering the phrase about taking the harder road, I went against these people. I did okay in Iraq, made a few bad decisions with my grandma and finishing my fathers estate was like pulling teeth and the lawyer was the dentist with-out Novocaine.
The power of attorney for my grandma and my fathers estate overlapped. I entered into a very deep depression. I isolated myself from everybody. When I began to emerge or wake up as I like to think of it I found a few groups that excepted me and so I began to volunteer for things to get me out. To meet people. It went okay for a while, but then it just got really bad. I ended up not following through on anything. There were a few years, I would begin something and then just disappear. Like my blogs, Mary Kay and many other things. I’d start something work on it for a while and then disappear. A little over two years ago I decided to stop, and I did. Kind of. I don’t want to drop the ball anymore and when I say I will do something I want to follow through. The best way to do that is to not say I’m going to do anything. To live completely in the moment. To live impulsively rather than planning out what I will do for the weeks ahead. This is why I had a hard time my last few semester in school. Taking class requires a person to be able to plan ahead and it is also why I can’t budget my money.
Now, I’ve learned a lot about socializing. Volunteering is only a small piece of that puzzle. I’ve wanted to start doing things again for other people. So I need to find ways of following through on my commitments. But this is a hard thing for me to get back to after a decade of me avoiding responsibility. A year ago I was asked to be on a mission comity, I’ve gone to a few meetings, but I’m scared of taking on anything. This blog, work and Bikurup are the only things that I’ve not given up on and there were a few times I was ready to give up writing for a career. It has just kept coming back to me. Thankfully. However this time is only due to me being unemployed for a long time. I didn’t want to write because it was heartbreaking when I felt the need to give it up last time and I don’t want to experience that again. But I’m at the point now that I need it back in my life. I need other things back in my life. My impulsiveness needs room for a bit of commitment.
CJ Myer 