The Merry-Go-Round

I remember when I was much younger going to playgrounds and having fun on the merry-go-round. I'm not talking about the carousels that you see at amusement parks and the like, but the simple, child-powered rotating platforms with bars or handles to which children can cling while riding. I recall trying to spin the merry-go-round so fast that people would be clinging to the bars and hanging on for dear life while their legs were jutting out parallel to the ground from the centrifugal force created by the rapid spinning motion of the ride. Gosh, that was fun.

I often feel that my life is that merry-go-round and I am the kid holding on white-knuckled to the bars of sanity and the handles of normalcy as my life spins wildly round and round threatening to make me lose my grip. Only now, it's not so much fun anymore. Now it's a struggle to maintain some semblance of control over all of the "stuff" that life throws at you on a daily basis.

Life just seems to whiz by way too rapidly. I know that most everyone probably feels this way, except maybe those who are suffering somehow or are in prison, but as I get older it is bothering me more and more. The question that I keep posing to myself is, "How do I get off the merry-go-round or at least slow it down slightly?" I just feel that there is not nearly enough time to do everything that needs to be done (work, household chores, etc) along with doing the things that you really want to do (spend time in the wilderness, write, visit with family, hang out with friends, travel, etc). I guess the most frustrating thing is that no matter how many times I ask myself that question, I just can't seem to come up with an answer. I'm not sure if there really is an answer. In our modern culture, I think my question is the eternal question that gnaws at everybody. How do I find time to do it all?

Don't misunderstand my meaning here. I'm not saying that I have a bad life; quite the contrary. I need more time and opportunity to enjoy the things in life that are meant to be enjoyed: love, friends, family, adventure, and so forth. The problem is that "real life" gets in the way all too often. There are people who say that money isn't everything and I would agree with them 100 percent, but the unfortunate truth is that you need money to live and if you want to live comfortably and have money to be able to do things, you generally have to work hard . Few of us luck out and win the lottery or come into vast amounts of money some other way that is legal. It is a sobering fact that most of us won't really have any extended time off from work (healthy) until we're retired. Let's be honest, will we really enjoy things in our 60s and 70s like we would in our 20s, 30s, and 40s? I don't think so. It's just too bad that we don't have all that leisure time when we're young and can enjoy it to the fullest. A friend of mine from college was recently relating his similar frustration to me, and I came across this (sorry, it's somewhat difficult to read).

I've never been a huge fan of Seinfeld, but I must have received that in an email at some point and hung onto it. I'm glad that I did because it's humorous and has the ring of truth.

I guess that the bottom line is that I want to slow down the merry-go-round that is my life and I just don't know how. In the longer term, I am going to come up with a basic plan of how I will set myself up over the next several years so that I can slow things down in the future. At least then I will feel like I am headed in the right direction instead of just spinning and getting dizzy.