Mission Outdoors

It’s been a while since I’ve written.

Not because I have had a lack of amusing, interesting, or profound thoughts to share, but rather that I’ve been afraid to write them down. There is something wonderful but often terrifying about writing. To be honest, for the past few months I’ve been too afraid to solidify my thoughts in writing.

But tonight I’m in the mood. It’s time to start writing again.

I just came home from Del Taco (a usual haunt of the Saddleback film students) where I had an interesting conversation with a friend. He told me about the months he spent living in his car when his parents had kicked him out of the house because he didn’t have a job. He said that they were some of the most productive months of his life. Away from home and the distractions of video games and junk food, he was able to be healthier and read and write freely.

As he described his experience to me, I saw that we were both very similar in our addictive personalities and our tendency for laziness, and that got me thinking that what worked for him might work for me. Maybe I really needed to stay out of the house more. In the last month or so I really haven’t been home much at all, and I barely see my parents anymore. But when I am home, I spend the majority of my time on the computer on Facebook or other websites. The internet is the biggest way I avoid my responsibilities.

I’m not prepared to quit cold turkey. There are parts of the internet that I really enjoy that, when used in the right proportion and context, can be beneficial. But I want to be doing other more important things, and it has to stop getting in the way of that.

I could sum up the past few years of my life by saying that under the pressure of increasing responsibility I have taken increasingly drastic measures to avoid it and the knowledge of this caused me to be even more self-destructive. The resolutions I made at the beginning of the year were my way of recognizing this and attempting to fix it. What I realize now is that I was trying to fix too many big problems in my life at once. I set my goals too high, and therefore failed (as I had always known secretly that I would) to achieve them.

So, I’m setting my sights lower. I am condensing my ten resolutions into one: stay out of the house as much as possible. I mean this in a physical way. Even being in the backyard is better than sitting inside. The more I’m out of the house, the more I will get done, and the better the chance is that I will do something productive and healthy. This is something that I feel I can achieve. The only resolution I have succeeded in so far is to become and remain a vegetarian. I believe this was because it is something that involves restraint rather than action. Since staying out of the house and away from the computer is a form of restraint, I feel that it is achievable.

I’m really quite excited about this decision. For a long time I’ve had a desire to do healthier things, and now I think I’ve found a way. The mission has begun.