Self Exploration (day 8) – Learning

I feel like crying right now. When I share what I know, trying to help, and somebody says: “stop that,” I feel like crying. I have reached the point in my life where I’ve realized the importance of my actions, my effort, my dedication, my sharing, and what I’m very interested in right now: my awareness.

Apathy is not my strongest suit.

Overwhelm seems to be one of my stronger suits. I’ve read the books, I’ve taken notes, I’ve written the plans and plotted the goals. Most days this empowers me, others it cripples me.

I do not know how to listen without devising what I believe are positive action plans.

Is this a fault?

I almost always listen and take key lessons away to apply to my life. This is learning to me, and must start with me. But I don’t stop there. I also think of you, whose life is close to me, and I want to enrich your life with the same energy and knowledge I’ve been vitalized with.

I have learned not everybody is made of the same cloth I’m made from. Not everybody believes in the same things I believe in. We are each on such unique paths that we can only share little glimpses of that path with another soul. It’s up to us, ourselves, to reflect – or not – upon what has been shared with us. Not everybody wants to learn the same things I’m learning. Not everybody wants to even learn.

It is hard for me to understand when somebody’s goals, aspirations, and intrigue doesn’t align with mine. Being aware and intentional, it confuses me about our relationship.

I am learning sometimes it’s important to… you know.. just chill man.

I want to learn. About myself, about and from you, about psychology, about sociology, about science and nature and biology and anatomy and health and fitness and astrology and theories on everything.

I feel like crying when anybody I care deeply about reminds me they have no desire to learn from me. When I’m told this, it shakes my ego, and my reaction is like me trying to speak a foreign language. I just say it louder, clearer, and more earnest.

I ask myself frequently if I should let this affect me. The person I love does not want or cannot learn from me? Do I speak clearer or do I give up?

Understanding these truths should allow me to freely flow with my truths, shouldn’t it?

Gandhi spoke of early in his South African days he realized he was a reformer, and acknowledged what this truly meant as a life long journey. I imagine him saying in a British accent while patting my shoulder: “Not an easy task, my boy.” And laughing heartily.

One thing I have learned over my many years of wading through heaps and heaps of material online, raw information from other minds in the world, is that there is a possibility that there is no right path. This is not a conversation about the environment’s health or my political views, this is a conversation about different styles of learning, different paths to life.

For the record, I don’t usually cry. I get a ball in my throat and feel my eyes get wetter, but my eyes rarely drip. I usually breathe it out. I usually write it out. It helps.