Uncomfortableness - Life is not Linear

“We should not, like sheep, follow the herd of creatures in front of us, making our way where others go, not where we ought to go.”—Seneca

Life is not linear, well it shouldn’t be at least. 

We often get caught in the straight line and projection that we’ve been told life should go. Go to school, get a job, find a companion, get married, have kids, buy a house, spend your life saving for retirement and paying off that house, then settle down to watch the world pass by. This is the extreme life-long linear track with ups and downs along the way, it is generally fairly linear along the whole of life. Many people successfully veer from that linear track, some of the world’s most successful and accomplished individuals. This track still exists but is becoming less of the norm, less prevalent in newer generations.

What about the day in and day out linear track that gets us caught in a rut. Sleep, wake, breakfast, work, lunch, work, dinner, relax, bed, and throw in groceries, laundry, cooking, cleaning....rinse and repeat. A spiral of adulthood that drains our every essence of growth, exploration, and creativity.

Life is in 3D though (for those more aware of surroundings maybe it’s 4D or 5D), we should be living life as such. Multidimensional.

We tend to go through the ups and downs with struggles in life, rarely do we ever take a big step left or right. Veering beyond typical normalcy, that spot where you purposefully challenge yourself and make your life a little more difficult. 

The downs in life are generally out of your control, the challenges thrown at you like traffic, a flat tire, a spilled coffee, a sick child, or a family sickness. Rarely, with cognitive awareness, do we purposefully put ourselves in a difficult situation. Likely, being terrible at something isn’t what we want people to see in us. 

What about being terrible at something, then trying it and maybe being a little less terrible, do it some more and maybe be a little less terrible. How fun is that? You just put yourself into a place you weren’t comfortable with and made it a little more comfortable. We don’t like to do that, it’s unnatural and takes a lot of hard work. 

Have a look at a child in many aspects. Learning to ride a bike for example, it takes a lot of passion and doesn’t come easy at all without practice. That’s the great thing with kids, their passion to learn new things and creativity to figure out how to make it happen...we lose this as adults with our need for safety and routines.

That’s where most of the beauty in life comes from. Those moments of turning the uncomfortable into something natural, comfortable, and actually pleasing. It’s where we all belong, life isn’t meant to be linear. The most beautiful things in life are off the beaten path, yet we fear going there as we fear the unknown.

In signing up for the marathon 11 weeks before, without ever really being a runner, I took a huge step to the side of my normalcy. My first, pushed, timed run had me at 11kms....over 31kms short of my ultimate goal. I was exhausted, legs were burning, and I felt like I’d run for hours. Turned out it was only 1 hour and I could expect at least 4 times that in 11 weeks. I was terrible at it, couldn’t have gone any further that day but didn’t give up on it in March. Less than a few weeks later I was running over 15kms with no trouble. I was terrible at it but slowly became a little less terrible at it, by confronting the difficulty over and over again.

Forcefully find something you are terrible at. Confront it head on by doing it, although you’re terrible at it and people will look at you like you’re terrible at it. Who cares, you’ll be a little less terrible the second time and you know that means you’ve grown. That’s where life is lived, in making the uncomfortable comfortable. 

DadBud