Complacency seems to be a buzzword today. It is defined by “a feeling of being satisfied with how things are and not wanting to try to make them better”. In layman terms, it means you are so comfortable with your present state that anything (or anyone) who threatens those warm fuzzies will be shunned to eternity.
But then life throws you a curve ball, just to see if you’re paying attention.
I’m in a waiting stage of life, in between comfortable and terrified. Between staying and going. To put it lightly, I am uncomfortable. With the unknown. With the known. With the added variables that come with life years and relationships. With all the stuff I have yet to plan, but can’t because it’s too soon. You could say I have been very comfortable in the last 11 years.
Or not…
Despite this transitional period of what I like to call “Saturdays at Costco”, I am trying ever so hard to keep busy, be present, while preparing my brain (and subsequent rabbit hole) for what will inevitably be a life-changing adventure. Or what I have entitled this chapter as: Stefi’s Grand Experiment.
The more I gear up for this cross-country endeavor, the more I see complacency around me. In myself. In my friends. In my family. How very lucky we are to be able to even entertain complacency. #OnlyInAmerica. And I do know I am one of the lucky ones. There are so many unknowns it’s laughable. And who wouldn’t want a life adventure?
But as comfortable as we get, life likes to throw that damn curveball. As scared and full of anxiety I am to journey into this unknown, how can I not? When opportunities in my life appear as what I like to call “universe gems”, I just have to make a decision and stick with it. I’ve both taken and turned down said universe gems, and I have neither regretted nor rued over those decisions. But for some reason, this one’s a doozy. This one could go either way. This one is the epitome of “fork in the road”. Two life directions. One choice. Sounds like a Tom Petty song.
And while this decision is mine and mine alone (and has already been made), I still waver in the perpetual unknown spiral of life. As I grow older, I realize – the more time I spend with the people I care about, the more life I feel I’m living. And at the end of it all, I want to be remembered more for the 2am porch convos over V&Ts (w/2 limes) and not for the amount of product I produced in a given week. And therein lies the perpetual rub – I am leaving the comfort of all I have ever known to journey to a place I’m not even sure I’ll like – filled with strangers I have yet to call my friends, while leaving behind relationships that have helped shaped me more in the last four years than in my entire lifetime. All for the unstableness of an industry I have grown to love. For someone in as unstable as a career path as it comes, you would think I would be used to the rocky road by now. #JustHandOverTheIceCream
While the future chapters remain unwritten, the present storyline is filled with angst.
Just as I get used to being complacent, life throws that god damn curveball just to see if I’d been listening.
And for that, the lessons will always remain the same. I’m stronger than I ever hoped to be. This will not be the end of me. For when fear looks me in the eye, I’ll be smiling as I walk on by.
