It Never Ends, Does It?

I was on a call with my dad the other day and he asked how I was doing. I said as a fact, and not necessarily to complain, that I was always tired. He said that it's because my responsibilities are more now and "I hope you know it will still increase."

Lol.

I know we always complain about adulting like a joke but there's a sadness to this whole "being born and basically work till you retire" thing, if you're lucky enough to even have the capacity to retire.

The other day I was on another call with two of my guys, both who recently became dads. And the hilarity of it all is that we all now understand to a degree some of the stuff our parents went through. I'm at an age where my parents already had me and I can't imagine the multiplier effect of every wrong decision I make or don't make affecting an small human with no agency. I can barely keep myself afloat, talkless of another being that is 100% dependent on me.

Shout out to all the mums and dads reading this lol.

But it's also a weird thing about life where we need responsibility to feel fulfiled. Even if I had all the money I could want, all the access I could want and all the things I could ever need, at the end of it all is just a black hole of nothingness. We need responsibility to make all of that mean something.

For some people, it's raising a family. For some, it's running a business that's solving a problem and paying salaries that keep other families afloat. For others, it's having charities and giving back. You get out of bed every morning knowing that if you don't do what you do, it would affect someone negatively.

Sometimes purpose is just the fact that another person needs you. When the stakes are limited to you, selfishness is not always enough motivation. It's easier to push through difficult things when someone or something needs you. Strange, isn't it?

So, no, it doesn't end. Something about our psyche needs the struggle. The struggle just upgrades from survival. I used to hear things our parents would say and I'm slowly beginning to sound like them. I thought things like this were "copium", a way to feel better about a situation that's not ideal. But there has been some truth to the need to work hard. It gives things value.

And you don't have to have a kid or a large scale business to have repsonsibility. It could be just your responsibility to your partner, your work place, yourself, your future self. The weight of being an adult is heavy regardless of where you are in life. The difference is how much you can stretch, how much capacity you have.

And you can only build capacity by taking on things you don't know how you can handle.

I'm the most stressed I've been in a while and I while I have certain emotional challenges I'm going through, I have my reasons to get out of bed. I have my reasons to push through the discomfort. I tell myself difficult things are often how you know the goal is worth it. My verbiage has changed. My self talk has changed. I now value the difficulty because it means what I'm doing means something. It may not result in a high feeling at the end but I would be able to look at myself in the mirror with pride that I'm capable of doing difficult things and I'm not one to quit just because something it hard.

And then, hop on to the next thing because truly, it doesn't end.