Antimatter — Stop Annihilating Your Life
When I was younger I was told that my dad had written a book called 101 Excuses. I suspect that was probably a passive-amusive way of informing me that my excuses, although obviously clever and well thought out, were nothing new.
So just now, amidst a metaphorical pile of half-finished self-help books, it occurred to me that it would be handy to have a place on the wall to put my next big goal. Then it occurred to me to ask why I thought such a thing would help me in any way, given that I clearly already know what I want to do. Since starting to write this I’ve actually forgotten what the next big goal was. What came of that line of inquiry? It was an excuse to explain my latest bout of non-motivation in the face of impending circumstances to my mother and anyone else within earshot. Then an epiphany!
Of all the excuses and ideas I’ve mentally created through the years: detailed images and descriptions of if-onlies, many were created with the express purpose of putting a “NOT” door in front of them. In other words, I’ve been creating anti-matter for years — visualizing circumstances which could better my current situation and then using them in defence of a storyline of mediocrity and failure rather than allowing them to come to fruition and, well, matter.
The thing is, teachers have written on practically every one of my report cards how I could excel if I only applied myself to what the class is learning and yet that potential has been co-opted toward creating anti-matter as some sort of bizarre experiment to fuel a paraoxically boring life of boredom avoidance.
Anti-Matter: Thoughts, ideas, words, beliefs et cetera which annihilate forward momentum and change.
Great idea: I have a perfectly good block of sticky notes on which to write goals and create a mini mint-coloured mosaic of optimal me on my door. And so— I need only decouple my creativity from my excuse-factory. Could it be so simple?
They say that the more complex an explanation for something, the less likely the person explaining it comprehends it… So perhaps this:
We create ideas all the time. It’s up to us to decide whether these ideas matter and are going to help move us forward, or if they’ll help defend where we’re at. (Like that Civilization game from Sid Meyer.) We can continue making anti-matter and anihilating our lives’ potential, and yet also we can live lives that matter to us.
And the obligatory quote-of-the-article:
“Be who you are and say what you feel, because those who mind don’t matter, and those who matter don’t mind.”
