Choosing a path and following it has never been a strength of mine. It's not a stretch to link my indecisive nature directly to my anxiety disorder, and likewise to my low self esteem. It doesn't always occur, but it is not uncommon for me to get hung up when faced with choices... especially timed ones.
If I have a gut instinct, I'll second guess it. If I think I've thought it through a lot, I recall other times I felt the same and ended up being wrong anyway... and I'll second guess it. In timed situations, I'll debate until the last possible moment, where the debate all goes out the window and I do a mental equivalent of a coin flip.
Dialing the scope back a bit, indecision has been a recurring motif. What to do with my life, for instance. I just never really figured that out. Nothing ever jumped out at me much, outside of the general feeling that whatever I did needed to allow me a voice - and a degree of autonomous creative output.
I never found the skill or right medium in that regard, or maybe I just gave up trying to choose. Everywhere I looked, all I saw were people more talented than I lining up to jump into the meatgrinder of competition, ready to backstab each other and sell out their ideals for that all important paycheck. Only the most talented people with a vision seemed to be able to speak clearly and in their own distinct voice, and who the hell am I and how far do I need to go before I could ever hope to strike gold the way those people have?
And the whole rat race of it all. When creating on someone else's schedule, it feels forced to me. Anything creative (or tangentially creative-related) I've ever done that I was satisfied with came about after letting the ideas stew in my mind and spring out whenever they were fully cooked.... and I had the burst of energy and will to transmit those ideas out of the ether and into words, images or otherwise. It always comes, for me, on it's own damned time.
When you want to get paid though, that shit doesn't fly.
Thus I find myself in a position of a 42 loser I'm still hung up on the same perplexing question that every high school kid faces: What the hell do I do with my life?
The best I've been able to do in my four decades is determine the things I don't want to do and the person I don't want to be. At least that's something?
Perhaps deep down, my indecision and lack of general direction is what truly draws me to the Appalachian Trail.
Sure, there are choices. There are forks, side trails and so forth. One can choose to go Northbound or Southbound, or Flip-Flop. One can choose when to begin, what gear to bring and how much they'll pamper themselves along the way or how hard to rough it.
But generally speaking: Follow the white blazes, whichever direction you choose, and whatever digressions you make along the way. Just return to the white blazes and follow them in your direction... and you will make it to Mt Katahdin in Maine, or Springer Mt. in GA... or Harper's Ferry, WV.
I can take my time, within reason. I can stop and enjoy sights or speed by them. But I'll have a direction to go and, assuming I don't stray too far from the path and get lost, there should always be a marker to guide me towards my goal.
If only the real world had such an equivalent.
And as I walk by those blazes - northbound in my case - there will be time to think about what comes after. Maybe I'll figure something out, and maybe I won't .... but I'll be thinking about things as I grow as a person and experience more of the world - gaining small victories along the way. In short, I'll be in a better place mentally (I hope, at least) which may in turn help me think more clearly. More realistically, and without the ol' beast Panic adding his two cents and derailing everything as usual.
I'll also have plenty of time to write, take photos and video footage and maybe even sketch a bit.
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