{"id":344,"date":"2014-01-26T20:50:25","date_gmt":"2014-01-26T20:50:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/laurelantur.com\/index.php\/2014\/01\/26\/2014-1-5-losing-my-way\/"},"modified":"2014-01-26T20:50:25","modified_gmt":"2014-01-26T20:50:25","slug":"2014-1-5-losing-my-way","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mysticalexpressivearts.com\/index.php\/2014\/01\/26\/2014-1-5-losing-my-way\/","title":{"rendered":"I hate bucket lists"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure style=\"width: 300px\" class=\"wp-caption alignnone\"><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/static1.squarespace.com\/static\/5181e760e4b04f94760cb317\/51832db8e4b0046126d0409f\/52e57debe4b0423ffa1e5274\/1390771692177\/Hand%2B1%2Bsm.jpg?w=900\" alt=\"Bound, or like puppet strings. Tiny, tight constraints.\"\/><figcaption class=\"wp-caption-text\">Bound, or like puppet strings. Tiny, tight constraints.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n<p>This week an email was sent to me and my colleagues asking us if we would like to share our bucket lists. This piqued my interest for a moment, and then I felt like sobbing. I couldn&#8217;t think of anything at all.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve had a rich life. I&#8217;ve travelled, had kids, lived in many places, eaten at interesting places. I have already been privileged to have experience many of the things&nbsp;that go on a bucket list. I&#8217;ve had my adventures. I&#8217;m in my quiet years now, and that is fine. But lately I worry that the only thing I have to look forward to is brushing my teeth and doing the dishes.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Since recently completing graduate school I&#8217;ve had the same feeling of being lost in transition that I had when I finished my undergrad degree. This time I have less energy and many more trap-like responsibilities, deep roots in my career and community, and the knowledge of the rapidly approaching challenges of retirement and how far behind I am in preparing for it. Oh I&#8217;m still young, but I am middle aged and lately I have been feeling it and it is making me sad.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Here is a quote that captures my melancholy:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>\u201cA great fire burns within me, but no one stops to warm themselves at it, and passers-by only see a wisp of smoke\u201d \u2015 Vincent van Gogh<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>And another that give me a sense of hope and resolve:<\/p>\n<blockquote>\n<p>&#8220;Just do your work. And if the world needs your work it will come and get you. And if it doesn&#8217;t, do your work anyway. You can have fantasies about having control over the world, but I know I can barely control my kitchen sink. That is the grace I&#8217;m given. Because when one can control things, one is limited to one&#8217;s own vision.&#8221; &#8211; Kiki Smith<\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<p>What would happen if I surrendered to the apparent emptiness of my life, my personal journey? What would happen if I stopped trying to control, lead, facilitate, manipulate to gain something from it all? What if I stopped feeling entitled and instead felt grateful?<\/p>\n<p>\u00a0<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>This week an email was sent to me and my colleagues asking us if we would like to share our bucket lists. This piqued my interest for a moment, and then I felt like sobbing. I couldn&#8217;t think of anything at all.&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>I&#8217;ve had a rich life. I&#8217;ve travelled, had kids, lived in many places, eaten at interesting places. I have already been privileged to have experience many of the things&nbsp;that go on a bucket list. I&#8217;ve had my adventures. I&#8217;m in my quiet years now, and that is fine. But lately I worry that the only thing I have to look forward to is brushing my teeth and doing the dishes.&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_monsterinsights_skip_tracking":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_active":false,"_monsterinsights_sitenote_note":"","_monsterinsights_sitenote_category":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-344","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mysticalexpressivearts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mysticalexpressivearts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mysticalexpressivearts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mysticalexpressivearts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mysticalexpressivearts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=344"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mysticalexpressivearts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/344\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mysticalexpressivearts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=344"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mysticalexpressivearts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=344"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mysticalexpressivearts.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=344"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}