Sometimes, the easiest questions to ask are the ones with the most complicated answers, and of all of life's questions, "What do I want to do in life?" is probably the simplest question a person can ask, and yet it generally takes a lifetime to truly figure the answer out.
Of course, for Christians, there's the nickel answer "I want to serve God", that if true, simply begs the second question "How?". Serving God isn't an 8-5 gig, it's a lifestyle, and it's definitely not limited to any one thing. Many people spend their lives serving God, and quite faithfully, yet never go overseas and do missions work, nor do they ever stand in front of a church and preach.
Besides, being a philosopher (especially one that has a blog), I *hate* nickel answers. They're boring, and intellectually speaking, they're a cop-out. Nickel answers are given when people don't want to give the real answer, and are trying to dodge the question.
What do I want to do in life?
I suppose the question requires looking back in life to when I was a child. What did I want then, and what of those things still applies?
I never wanted to be President, and I stopped wanting to be a fireman when I realized that 90% of their calls are for car wrecks, not burning houses. Studying dinosaurs isn't nearly as cool as Jurassic Park makes it seem, and astronauts don't go to other planets, so those faded. Being a pilot was my first dream anyways, long before the others.
What do I want to do in life?
Most days I just want to serve God. It's back to that nickel answer, and I hate it, but I don't know what else to say. I never really had any other dreams, and neither of them are reality. I'm surrounded by airplanes I'm not allowed to fly, and never will be, and I keep meeting families with kids, but while kids are fun, they're not my kids.
I feel like I'm being ripped in half most days. I'm surrounded by the two things I want most, but they're not for me.
People, being hypocrites, keep throwing this dilemma back in my face with a "you just need to trust God more." Because apparently, trusting God enough to drop my own plans to go into missions (I really wanted to be a gunsmith, and was a few months away from applying for a patent on a rifle design) nearly four years ago wasn't actually trust, neither is sacrificing everything that got in the way of that, and neither is getting on a plane to fly to Africa (and Haiti, for that matter) and actually going into the mission field. None of that is trust because if it was actually trust, I wouldn't be struggling.
Honestly, I'm quite sorry that I ever spent so many years hoping that someday, somehow, I'd end up a pilot or a father. Shattered dreams suck, and I'm living with two of them. False hope is poison to the soul, and every time I meet a nice girl, only for it to fall apart, it gets harder and harder to not drown in bitterness. Every time I hear pilots bitch about having to fly somewhere, I want to scream.
What do I want to do in life?
I don't know anymore. I'm am aircraft mechanic, I like being a missionary, but putting those two together means I will spend the rest of my career surrounded by pilots with families, and that's a miserable thought. I could console myself with dreams that some day I'll meet a nice girl and start a family, but that's what I've been doing for most of my life, and obviously that hasn't worked yet.
What do I want to do in life?
I don't know. The thing I want to do most in life, serve God as a missions mechanic is also the option that promises the most unhappiness.
What do I want to do in life?
To serve God and be happy.
I have no clue how to go about that. I hate the idea of doing what I truthfully want to do most in life. I hate that I look forward to missions and see valuable, rewarding work keeping the birds in the air, yet at the same time I see that it doesn't come close to resembling happiness. It means being "Uncle Soren" but not "Dad", and spending a lifetime trying not to be bitter when pilots complain.
What do I want to do in life?
Keep moving forward, because in spite of the misery, despair, loneliness, and bitterness, I still trust God more than I trust anything else, even my own emotions. Besides, if there's anything I know in life, it's that meaningful misery is better than the pointless bliss most of the world seems to be chasing. If nothing else, some day I will die, the misery will end, and I will go to Heaven, where God will wipe away all the tears from my eyes, and there will be no more death, nor crying, nor sorrow, nor any more pain, for the former things will have passed away.
What do I want to do in life?
Fight the good fight, finish the race, and keep the faith. Between now and then, there are things I would absolutely love to do, and have spent my life hoping that God would allow me to do, but the only thing that really matters is to keep the faith and keep moving forward. The Bible never promised me happiness, but it does promise an unbeatable retirement package. While it's not all of what I want in life, that's certainly more than enough.
Of course, for Christians, there's the nickel answer "I want to serve God", that if true, simply begs the second question "How?". Serving God isn't an 8-5 gig, it's a lifestyle, and it's definitely not limited to any one thing. Many people spend their lives serving God, and quite faithfully, yet never go overseas and do missions work, nor do they ever stand in front of a church and preach.
Besides, being a philosopher (especially one that has a blog), I *hate* nickel answers. They're boring, and intellectually speaking, they're a cop-out. Nickel answers are given when people don't want to give the real answer, and are trying to dodge the question.
What do I want to do in life?
I suppose the question requires looking back in life to when I was a child. What did I want then, and what of those things still applies?
I never wanted to be President, and I stopped wanting to be a fireman when I realized that 90% of their calls are for car wrecks, not burning houses. Studying dinosaurs isn't nearly as cool as Jurassic Park makes it seem, and astronauts don't go to other planets, so those faded. Being a pilot was my first dream anyways, long before the others.
I've wanted to be a pilot since I knew what an airplane was. There was never a time that I can recall that I didn't want to be a pilot, I fondly remember playing flight simulators when I was six, turning paper airplanes into a science when I was 7. Anything that resembled flying, I was into.
Of course, the FAA won't let me get a private pilot's license because I'm bipolar. So...childhood dream, meet the US Government. Wave goodbye, childhood dream.
Granted, I'm an aircraft mechanic instead, and I love it. I don't think I've ever had a job that I've been more passionate about than I am about fixing airplanes. It still stings on occasion (read: most days, but not every day) that I'm not allowed to have the chance to be a pilot, but I still love fixing planes. It's better than working on cars, anyways, if for no other reason that airplanes are frikkin' cool, and always will be.
Of course, the FAA won't let me get a private pilot's license because I'm bipolar. So...childhood dream, meet the US Government. Wave goodbye, childhood dream.
Granted, I'm an aircraft mechanic instead, and I love it. I don't think I've ever had a job that I've been more passionate about than I am about fixing airplanes. It still stings on occasion (read: most days, but not every day) that I'm not allowed to have the chance to be a pilot, but I still love fixing planes. It's better than working on cars, anyways, if for no other reason that airplanes are frikkin' cool, and always will be.
What do I want to do in life?
The other thing I've always wanted in some fashion was a family. There was of course that period when I was a kid when I didn't really know what to do with the strange and beautiful creatures called "girls", but I still knew that at some point, I needed to get one and start a family. The older I get, the stranger and more beautiful girls are, and I still want to get one and start a family.
But I'm 30 now, and that hasn't happened. Gotta find a nice girl to start a family with, and while I've met a lot of nice girls, it seems like half of them don't want kids these days. Three-quarters of the remainder simply aren't worth marrying. The rest got picked up years ago, it seems. It seems, of course, just means that's my perception, obviously there are still worthwhile, marriageable ladies out there that want kids, I just haven't met any.
What do I want to do in life?
Neither of my dreams are reality, neither of them seem likely to become reality any time soon, so I'm back to square one, with that same question.
What do I want to do in life?
But I'm 30 now, and that hasn't happened. Gotta find a nice girl to start a family with, and while I've met a lot of nice girls, it seems like half of them don't want kids these days. Three-quarters of the remainder simply aren't worth marrying. The rest got picked up years ago, it seems. It seems, of course, just means that's my perception, obviously there are still worthwhile, marriageable ladies out there that want kids, I just haven't met any.
What do I want to do in life?
Neither of my dreams are reality, neither of them seem likely to become reality any time soon, so I'm back to square one, with that same question.
What do I want to do in life?
Most days I just want to serve God. It's back to that nickel answer, and I hate it, but I don't know what else to say. I never really had any other dreams, and neither of them are reality. I'm surrounded by airplanes I'm not allowed to fly, and never will be, and I keep meeting families with kids, but while kids are fun, they're not my kids.
I feel like I'm being ripped in half most days. I'm surrounded by the two things I want most, but they're not for me.
People, being hypocrites, keep throwing this dilemma back in my face with a "you just need to trust God more." Because apparently, trusting God enough to drop my own plans to go into missions (I really wanted to be a gunsmith, and was a few months away from applying for a patent on a rifle design) nearly four years ago wasn't actually trust, neither is sacrificing everything that got in the way of that, and neither is getting on a plane to fly to Africa (and Haiti, for that matter) and actually going into the mission field. None of that is trust because if it was actually trust, I wouldn't be struggling.
Honestly, I'm quite sorry that I ever spent so many years hoping that someday, somehow, I'd end up a pilot or a father. Shattered dreams suck, and I'm living with two of them. False hope is poison to the soul, and every time I meet a nice girl, only for it to fall apart, it gets harder and harder to not drown in bitterness. Every time I hear pilots bitch about having to fly somewhere, I want to scream.
What do I want to do in life?
I don't know anymore. I'm am aircraft mechanic, I like being a missionary, but putting those two together means I will spend the rest of my career surrounded by pilots with families, and that's a miserable thought. I could console myself with dreams that some day I'll meet a nice girl and start a family, but that's what I've been doing for most of my life, and obviously that hasn't worked yet.
What do I want to do in life?
I don't know. The thing I want to do most in life, serve God as a missions mechanic is also the option that promises the most unhappiness.
What do I want to do in life?
To serve God and be happy.
I have no clue how to go about that. I hate the idea of doing what I truthfully want to do most in life. I hate that I look forward to missions and see valuable, rewarding work keeping the birds in the air, yet at the same time I see that it doesn't come close to resembling happiness. It means being "Uncle Soren" but not "Dad", and spending a lifetime trying not to be bitter when pilots complain.
What do I want to do in life?
Keep moving forward, because in spite of the misery, despair, loneliness, and bitterness, I still trust God more than I trust anything else, even my own emotions. Besides, if there's anything I know in life, it's that meaningful misery is better than the pointless bliss most of the world seems to be chasing. If nothing else, some day I will die, the misery will end, and I will go to Heaven, where God will wipe away all the tears from my eyes, and there will be no more death, nor crying, nor sorrow, nor any more pain, for the former things will have passed away.
What do I want to do in life?
Fight the good fight, finish the race, and keep the faith. Between now and then, there are things I would absolutely love to do, and have spent my life hoping that God would allow me to do, but the only thing that really matters is to keep the faith and keep moving forward. The Bible never promised me happiness, but it does promise an unbeatable retirement package. While it's not all of what I want in life, that's certainly more than enough.
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