The Romantic Masochist

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The Romantic Masochist

We’re taught from a young age to set goals. We’re taught (sorta) in high school how to plan for the future by attending a good college in hopes that after accumulating $60-100k in debt we can get that awesome $20 an hour J.O.B. In Sunday school, we’re taught how to love Jesus so we can get to heaven, which also is kinda like planning for the future, albeit a farther away future. Oh, and while we’re doing all these things, we’re supposed to plan for our future husband or wife, our future kids, our future mid-life crisis, our future potential divorce. And did we save up enough for that rainy day? This “planning” list is endless. And the truth of it all is that we can never really plan enough for the road ahead, for the future, because none of us really knows for certain what that future looks like, or if we’re even in it.

This can get kinda scary real quick.

Turning 25 this year really made me think about things, about where I’ve been and where I’m going. About who I am beneath everything. I started taking into account all I’ve accomplished and all I desire to accomplish before the final curtain drops. What I’ve discovered, and this is nothing really all that new, is that the painting looks awful different when you’re a kid. To a young mind, the colors seem vibrant. The landscapes breathtaking. The patterns original. The days always spring. As years and time drift by, the luster fades. The rolling hills erode. The patterns becomes clichés. The nights seem longer, colder. When I was 4, I think I had my first crush. By 5 or 6, I knew I wanted to be married (crazy much?). By 9, I wanted to sketch for Marvel and Disney. By 11, I traded one art for another and fell in love with writing. I started my first book at 12 and knew immediately that I wanted to be an author. Thirteen years later, and I am an accomplished author, though the painting is radically different than I imagined it might be. I’ve released 6 books and one is coming this summer. But my indecisive nature won’t let me commit to marriage just yet. Maybe it’s fear, questioning if mine will end up like my parents’. Not wanting my kids to suffer through that kind of pain. But is that a good enough reason to play chicken? I’ve always been in love with love, the idea of eternal romance, but sometimes I just feel stuck. The plan has some holes, methinks.

In some ways, this has been an amazing year. I completed schooling for cosmetology and now have my license. I’m working with my father as a stylist, and it’s kinda funny because he’s partly responsible for me becoming an author and for me becoming a stylist. Interesting how life works, huh? I finally moved into my own pad, and the feeling is a mixture of freedom and

unknowing, which can be fearful sometimes, especially coming from somebody with a big family. As I embark on this new “day job,” I’m re-realizing that success is hard to measure. That money can’t be god. I never thought I’d be doing this, or that my dreams would take this long to unfold. But maybe this was the plan all along. Somebody else’s. Somebody with more vision than I. My “plan” was to work my butt off in middle school, high school, and college so that I could be some bigshot writer. I’ve been humbled. I’ve been learning a lot about life, about what it takes to make a dream real, to give it flesh and bone and blood. My blood. My life. My soul.

I was invited to speak at a high school recently, and a girl asks me if I’ve ever thought about giving up (writing). Without even a second guess, I nod my head and answer, “All the time.” Some might think that’s depressing, but the reality is that regardless of whatever plans you have or don’t have, your feelings change as you age or mature. It’s an eternal romance. You may fall in and out of love, but in spite of that, you choose to love. In some ways, the younger you may creep up and remind you why you do it. The older you may remind you of deadlines, of goals you haven’t met, plans you haven’t made, people you’ve let down, dreams left unfulfilled. The war is in the mind. The war is against the man in the mirror more than any external force. The war is against your faith. There are times I want to quit. Times when I wonder why I had to fall in love with writing in the first place. It’s hard to go on, to persevere. And you wonder if anyone’s even listening anymore. At 25, there are more lucrative things in which to invest my time. And I think that maybe initially I embarked on this journey for selfish reasons, because I thought it would make me popular (it didn’t) or because it might grant me validation (it won’t) or because it would make me rich (it hasn’t). I’m in it now for a different reason. I choose to stay, a romantic masochist. I endure the struggle for the soul, for the richness I can dive into while exploring the new worlds of the characters I create. I’m in it for the richness that consumes the panic and the fear and the unknowing. My soul. Your soul. And the journeys we can take together, fearlessly. The plans don’t define you. The plans can’t save you. The plans aren’t enough to comfort you when the war gets bloody. Let something else drive. Let the idea of what could be, what might be join this war. And fight with everything you have.