DAY 37 - Baby Steps

A long, long time ago, perhaps three or four years ago when I created this blog for my original Blog Every Day... er, blog, I was really into YouTube. I followed a handful of people, but the ones who inspired me to do this whole thing were two YouTubers known as the vlogbrothers. 

If I am not mistaken, the original challenge these fine dudes proposed was a month-long Blog/Vlog Every Day in April, or BEDA for short. I made it a year for myself because... well, I thought it would be a nice challenge. My poor grasp on time most likely had a hand in this decision as well as my knack for underestimating things, but I digress.

Primarily, though, I thought that if I could do something as crazy as manage to blog every day in a year, I would somehow grow; somehow escape the rut I've been in ever since I finished high school. I won't get into the specifics now, but essentially it boils down to this question:

What do I want to do with my life?

I never really talked to anyone older than me about the whole process, so coming straight out of the gate, I felt like I had to make one big decision that would affect the rest of my life to the day I died. The vlogbrothers, though, had a good point of view on the topic, and it helped assuage my fears for the time being.

But then I stagnated. I was enjoying the present, so that's where my focus was. I didn't really do anything to move toward the future, thinking that I would somehow come up with what I wanted to do one day. 

Coincidentally, the vlogbrothers are Hank and John Green, the latter being a novelist. I started reading his books around the time I was still avidly watching YouTube videos, and I recently re-discovered a very relevant quote from Green's book, Looking For Alaska:

"Imagining the future is a kind of nostalgia... You spend your whole life stuck in the labyrinth, thinking about how you'll escape it one day, and how awesome it will be, and imagining that future keeps you going, but you never do it. You just use the future to escape the present."

So with that in mind, I want to start working toward a better me. There's a whole laundry list I'd like to go over, but for now I think I'll ask a couple of friends if the want to hit the gym.

Eric