I spent the better portion of my cognizant childhood trying to prove to my parents that I possessed this quality.
It was difficult to do this of course without an actual dog upon which to practice, but my mom said I could also demonstrate my responsibleness by clearing my plate after dinner, completing my Math Boxes tantrum-free, and remembering to brush my hair before school. I tried my best to do these things, but since none of them directly correlated to dogs or dog-chores as far as I could tell, it was easy to forget. I spent more energy pouring over dog books from the library and meticulously copying the picture captions into a notebook than I did cleaning my room or remembering what to pack in my backpack.
Today, fifteen years later, I’m supposed to have a better understanding of what it means to be responsible. After all, my family has a dog now! But recently, I’ve felt like my definition of responsibility (and I’m not just talking about my first-grade definition) has become completely insufficient. My choices can no longer be divided into clear-cut categories of “responsible” and “irresponsible,” and even if they could, I’m not sure it would be a helpful distinction.
It was difficult to do this of course without an actual dog upon which to practice, but my mom said I could also demonstrate my responsibleness by clearing my plate after dinner, completing my Math Boxes tantrum-free, and remembering to brush my hair before school. I tried my best to do these things, but since none of them directly correlated to dogs or dog-chores as far as I could tell, it was easy to forget. I spent more energy pouring over dog books from the library and meticulously copying the picture captions into a notebook than I did cleaning my room or remembering what to pack in my backpack.
Today, fifteen years later, I’m supposed to have a better understanding of what it means to be responsible. After all, my family has a dog now! But recently, I’ve felt like my definition of responsibility (and I’m not just talking about my first-grade definition) has become completely insufficient. My choices can no longer be divided into clear-cut categories of “responsible” and “irresponsible,” and even if they could, I’m not sure it would be a helpful distinction.
As I move forward in my post-college life (or backwards, or sideways---direction seems pretty irrelevant at this point), I feel a dual pull between two often conflicting impulses. One is the desire to advance in a career, to save money, pay off loans, create a stable and predictable schedule for myself. Some might call this the “responsible” impulse. It is the natural inclination for knowledge and security, the need to plan for the future. But the other impulse is equally strong and quite opposite. At the same time that I yearn for stability, I also want to quit all my jobs, move far away, and do something crazy and spontaneous and totally unexpected. I want to jump off cliffs, paddle down rapids, backpack across Iceland, and forget about savings accounts and “career paths”. I want to write a novel on a green hillside in New Zealand, ride my bike to the Pacific, discover the secret stories of the world’s forgotten.
I want both to carve out a Britta-sized space on this Earth and move fast enough that the space never forms.
My struggle with these conflicting impulses is not unique. I think the tension---the dual desire for stability and adventure, peace and conflict---exists naturally within each of us. No person wants to live a life of total monotony, no matter how pleasant their surroundings, but no person wants to live a life of total unpredictability either. We tend to yearn most for whatever it is we currently lack. To live exclusively in one camp or the other is exhausting and empty. We need both.
But how much of each is a question I have been pondering for the past few months. How much do I indulge my desire for variety and adventure and how much should I force the reasonable and practical part of my brain to buckle down and be responsible? If I’m currently employed and well-paid, is it idiotic to give that up just because I’m tired of it and want something new? Is it ok to move across the country or quit my job just for the heck of it?
This tension takes on a very tangible form. I'm currently working three very different jobs, six days a week, nearly ten hours a day. When I leave for my first job at FedEx every morning around 6 am, I feel like I'm packing for a weekend trip, not an average work day. I have my FedEx uniform, my designated FedEx backpack, my purse, my business-casual clothes for my office job, my running clothes and shoes for track practice, and sometimes a normal outfit if I'm heading somewhere directly after practice. I go straight from job to job to job. My free time is limited to the three hours after I get home from practice just before 6 pm until I go to bed around 9. And this time fills up fast.
It is this busy schedule and my desire to modify it into something more sane that has led me to ask these questions about what it means to be responsible, about how it is we determine what the “responsible” action is, and to what extent I should indulge my appetite for novelty. I’m considering quitting one of my jobs and devoting that time to writing, working on my novel, and possibly preparing a portfolio for a Masters in Fine Arts program. The idea is extremely appealing to me, but it means giving up a pretty substantial portion of my income and cutting back on the amount I’m currently devoting to student loans. I’m already a poor and indebted post-grad. Do I want to make myself even poorer?
As I debate this question internally, I tell myself that setting aside time for writing is an investment. If writing is really my goal and aspiration, then of course I should be committed to it. I owe it to myself to give this dream my full attention. But of course, I’m not being entirely honest with myself if I leave it at that. I also want to quit one of my jobs because I hate working on Saturdays and I want to take fun weekend trips this summer. And there is a lot of free time that I currently possess which I am not devoting to writing. What makes me think I will be more productive with more time?
What comes first: Paying off my student loans asap or pursuing my writing dreams? Money or free time? Reducing my stress-level today or for the distant future?
Believe it or not, I have been in some stage of writing this blog post for several weeks. This is not (clearly) because I'm devoting extreme care to the craft or quality of it but simply because I change my mind on what I think about this issue every couple days. I have completely restructured the organization of this post at least four times. Sometimes I think I'm ridiculous for even asking these questions. I should just go out and do whatever it is I want to do! I want to bike across America? Ok, so just go out and do it!
But then I think about all the single parents out there, all the people who are working even more hours a week than I am and yet still manage to retain their sanity. And I wonder: am I just being a wimp? I have no dependents; now is a perfect time in my life to focus on reducing my debt so that in the future I have more freedom to do the things I want to do. It's only for a season after all. I don't have to do what I am doing forever. I should just be patient a little longer. It's not like life only has this small window of opportunity for adventure and excitement and if I miss it now, I'm never going to get it back.
So I come back around to my original question: What is more important to me at this point: stability and security or adventure and the unknown? And if I make a choice, how long will I have to live with it?
I told myself before I graduated from college that I was not going to end up back in my hometown. When May 2012 came and I was left with no other option, I told myself my stay would be temporary, short-term. I would not "settle in" here.
I want both to carve out a Britta-sized space on this Earth and move fast enough that the space never forms.
My struggle with these conflicting impulses is not unique. I think the tension---the dual desire for stability and adventure, peace and conflict---exists naturally within each of us. No person wants to live a life of total monotony, no matter how pleasant their surroundings, but no person wants to live a life of total unpredictability either. We tend to yearn most for whatever it is we currently lack. To live exclusively in one camp or the other is exhausting and empty. We need both.
But how much of each is a question I have been pondering for the past few months. How much do I indulge my desire for variety and adventure and how much should I force the reasonable and practical part of my brain to buckle down and be responsible? If I’m currently employed and well-paid, is it idiotic to give that up just because I’m tired of it and want something new? Is it ok to move across the country or quit my job just for the heck of it?
This tension takes on a very tangible form. I'm currently working three very different jobs, six days a week, nearly ten hours a day. When I leave for my first job at FedEx every morning around 6 am, I feel like I'm packing for a weekend trip, not an average work day. I have my FedEx uniform, my designated FedEx backpack, my purse, my business-casual clothes for my office job, my running clothes and shoes for track practice, and sometimes a normal outfit if I'm heading somewhere directly after practice. I go straight from job to job to job. My free time is limited to the three hours after I get home from practice just before 6 pm until I go to bed around 9. And this time fills up fast.
It is this busy schedule and my desire to modify it into something more sane that has led me to ask these questions about what it means to be responsible, about how it is we determine what the “responsible” action is, and to what extent I should indulge my appetite for novelty. I’m considering quitting one of my jobs and devoting that time to writing, working on my novel, and possibly preparing a portfolio for a Masters in Fine Arts program. The idea is extremely appealing to me, but it means giving up a pretty substantial portion of my income and cutting back on the amount I’m currently devoting to student loans. I’m already a poor and indebted post-grad. Do I want to make myself even poorer?
As I debate this question internally, I tell myself that setting aside time for writing is an investment. If writing is really my goal and aspiration, then of course I should be committed to it. I owe it to myself to give this dream my full attention. But of course, I’m not being entirely honest with myself if I leave it at that. I also want to quit one of my jobs because I hate working on Saturdays and I want to take fun weekend trips this summer. And there is a lot of free time that I currently possess which I am not devoting to writing. What makes me think I will be more productive with more time?
What comes first: Paying off my student loans asap or pursuing my writing dreams? Money or free time? Reducing my stress-level today or for the distant future?
Believe it or not, I have been in some stage of writing this blog post for several weeks. This is not (clearly) because I'm devoting extreme care to the craft or quality of it but simply because I change my mind on what I think about this issue every couple days. I have completely restructured the organization of this post at least four times. Sometimes I think I'm ridiculous for even asking these questions. I should just go out and do whatever it is I want to do! I want to bike across America? Ok, so just go out and do it!
But then I think about all the single parents out there, all the people who are working even more hours a week than I am and yet still manage to retain their sanity. And I wonder: am I just being a wimp? I have no dependents; now is a perfect time in my life to focus on reducing my debt so that in the future I have more freedom to do the things I want to do. It's only for a season after all. I don't have to do what I am doing forever. I should just be patient a little longer. It's not like life only has this small window of opportunity for adventure and excitement and if I miss it now, I'm never going to get it back.
So I come back around to my original question: What is more important to me at this point: stability and security or adventure and the unknown? And if I make a choice, how long will I have to live with it?
I told myself before I graduated from college that I was not going to end up back in my hometown. When May 2012 came and I was left with no other option, I told myself my stay would be temporary, short-term. I would not "settle in" here.
It's now nearly April, and I'm fast approaching the one-year mark of my college graduation. And I'm still in Grand Rapids, still holding myself in that limbo between permanence and impermanence. It's not a very satisfying place to be.
I was thinking about this one day as I sat at my florescent-lit desk in my pink cubicle in the maze of an office building where I work. Suddenly, a sentence popped into my head. "Britta, you have no idea what is in store for you." Just like that, those words exactly. It felt separate from myself, like it was someone else's voice and not my own. I wrote it down on a piece of paper and pinned it to the pink wall.
It was the most comforting line I had heard in a long time.
Because it's so true. I have no idea what is in store for me. I can plan all I want---I could choose to stick with my current jobs, I could start something new, I could move to Chicago---and still I would have virtually zero control over my life. I was reading a manuscript for my job last week about a woman who was in a car accident that paralyzed her from the chest down. No one decides to go on that kind of adventure. It just happens. Life is utterly unpredictable. And yet, somehow, I find this reassuring rather than terrifying.
Nothing about this past year has been expected. It has unfolded week by week, day by day, with only a rare glimpse beyond the immediate future. It has come with unforeseen disappointments and heartaches, but there have also been equally unpredictable blessings. A year ago I could never have imagined the goodness that could come from coaching track and cross country, forming new friendships, strengthening old ones, and gaining new and strange work experience. My path could take a sharp turn next month---or tomorrow. I have no idea what is in store for me. And there is something exhilarating about that.
After weeks of thinking about and writing this post, after hundreds of deleted sentences and paragraphs, I still don't know what I'm going to do about my job situation. I don't know how I'd like to spend my next year or where I want to live. Heck, most of the time I don't even know if the choices I'm making are stupid or smart; I'm just sort of making them arbitrarily and hoping things shake out for the best.
If only responsibility were easy and straightforward, like it was when I was little and trying to convince my parents to get me a dog. I have a lot more options now, a lot more ways to live, and there is no way of knowing how any of them will turn out. It's really not a question of responsible vs. irresponsible, monotony vs. adventure. It's not that simple. Life never is. But there is a beauty in the complexity and a wonder in the mysteriousness of the future. It's all so much bigger than I am, and it keeps me humble.
