Welcome to the first post that I’ve started not on my famous nights known as “Monday Musings”! Sure, it may be a Tuesday night as I start this and the remnants of yesterday’s musings may still yet be trickling onto the page as I type, but facts are still facts. I embark upon writing hopefully what will be the next 20 of my posts now that the previous 20 are well in the rear view mirror. It’s kind of symbolic of how a new chapter of my life starts as I’ve graduated from college and am about to enter the working world officially in a couple of days; weird if you ask me or know me in any shape or form. While this may be a sort of brief “check up/life update” if you want to call it that, I’ve had some time to ruminate on a lot of matters over the past month or so, most of which has focused intently on the virtues of passion, value, and honesty that I thought about sharing.

It’s funny how long it takes perspective to really kick in sometimes. I always thought it synced in for me late at a, what is quite young now I realize, staggering 21/22 years old. Guess that is slightly my problem for thinking that I’ll only make it to 40 based on some gut feeling. Anyways, enough of my problems here. But problems are where the root of honesty comes into play. A great deal of time, we think that we are left helpless to many of life’s most mundane problems. In reality, it is the decision to take ownership and grave responsibility for your own problems that allows you to honestly assess direction and momentum of simple movements. Many, and you can include me into this batch, want to lay prone to some of the smallest problems in the world, but it is the ability to add a mental rewiring of wanting your problems and tackling them that makes everything tiredly and painfully worthwhile. Pain actually services semblance in outstanding narratives.

In facing yourself honestly, the simple idea of ease comes up of that very momentum of being honest with yourself. I’ve found time and time again myself calmly still and erratically antsy all at the same time. Ignorance and negligence taught me to be the former whereas honesty and, more importantly, passion taught me to be the latter. When they say your mind is fickle in nature and can take forever to really settle down on one sight, boy were they right. Rewarding challenge roots itself in the pursuit of passion. Just take it from Kobe or this elderly man at the Presidio Library who is sketching these wonderful replications of cars from newspaper clippings — pretty cool if you ask me. I think with further perspective, I’ve come to truly understand the notion of working towards something interesting to your being and mind if you want to actually live. It’s akin to the idea of the Empty Chill that I discussed earlier in this series when you know something is lacking. I could delve deeper into this matter but feel as if I’ve already done so in previous posts in this series; a better writer to check out if you want someone more knowledgeable on the matter is Ralph Waldo Emerson and his work Self-Reliance discussing bold self action and realization. Valiant action legitimizes undying eccentricity.

Something that is still taking its time to wrap my head around and is a continual work in progress is the idea of having a vision for yourself and how that extends outward towards the greater mass of humanity. Legacy is something that has enamored me for the longest of times, and as a result, I’ve wanted to create one for myself in the most unorthodox manner given societal norms and my background/upbringing. Everyone gets so fixated on the value prospect of a greater entity to us as individuals that we often forget to look at the converse of this equation. The simple switch gets flipped later on in life, maybe typically at that 40 year old mark so RIP to me, that goes from value seeking/obtaining to value generating/spreading. This is where vision comes into play to bring together all three of these virtues. Vision allows you to create a crystal image of where you were, where you are now, and where you want to go by allowing yourself to be completely honest with yourself, remaining passionate about the plan, and seeking valuable output through your mere existence. The vision may need to be redefined here and there but the value prospect will remain the same throughout. Hanging onto non-ending satisfaction transforms you.

Off to the next 20 posts and 20ish years (hopefully more though idk) as the new journey starts in SF. I’ll miss the carefree, chill, and relaxing environment of SoCal, but a bit of me says that more mellow quality will stick with me throughout it all. Who knows when the next page(s) will turn for me. I have a good feeling they will in less than 5 years. A change of scenery, work, lifestyle etc.? Who knows, but maybe it’s just already penned into that vision thing I talked about earlier. Got to keep feeding into the high high hopes for a living, you feel..? And just for some added fun, take a look at the first letter of each word in the last sentence in each of the previous three sections. No, that was not intentional but a mastery of the craft; maybe not though.