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I'm certainly plagued by some internal turmoil, and I feel free to admit that. I'm at an uncertain period in my life, and I do not know whether I will be sucessful at achieving any of my goals. My past record has been littered by public failures, and successes noone close to me wants to recognize. I've failed at getting 3 businesses started, my academic track record is meager at best, and whilst I consider myself intelligent, I do not know whether I'll be able to perform as expected in college, which is what I'm looking at right now. I have trouble moderating myself, and even though I've spent the last couple of years working on my skillset, I'm not sure whether that will cut it for what I want to do in life. I'm struggling with the amount of social expectations that I'm being handed. For one I have friends who expect me to do great things, and they are on track to do great things. I also expect myself to do great things. They're all in college now, I'm not. One kid I helped with bio homework back when I was in 9th grade and he was in 11th grade now studies Biomedical Engineering at Columbia University. There's another former classmate at NYU who I'm helping with physics and programming problems, and he looks up to me as an example. Can't say that about myself. But then, if you look at the way I've been performing, you'd expect me to fail in a spectacular manner. C student from the get go, then after changing schools oscialating wildly from getting straight As and straight Fs. Only student in the entire school that managed to get on academic probation with a GPA of 3.19. Then I got kicked out of that school as well. I'm not proud of that. I'm not proud of the school I managed to graduate from either. Then college right now. I'm not sure which school I'll even get into. Ideally, I'll get into a respectable school abroad, perform well, finally get to use the skills I've been honing for years, make some money, transfer to one of the schools I was told I should be in, that I could be in if my life wasn't such a mess. That's a long shot though. Then there's the less than rosy but equally possible probability that I'll ascend astronomically for the first semester and crash and burn within semester 2. Get kicked out second year, no job, no degree. My health in the gutter because I overworked myself and couldn't quite cope with the workload. It's quite the conflicting, uncertain situation to be in, and I don't think I'll be any less anxious about it before I figure out how well each of the bridges I've got to cross hold up. They look shoddy, but you never know. I don't think meditation will help me with that. |
One of the aspects of experiencing the present moment is cutting away that ego - realising that ego isn't actually part of conscioussness, it's just something you're choosing to cling onto and identify with.
That doesn't mean that you can't pursue goals and achievement - just that you're not tying them to your happiness. To quote Power Of Now by Eckhart Tolle (which you may want to consider reading):
"Does it matter whether we achieve our outer purpose, whether we succeed or fail in the world? // It matters to you as long as you haven't realised your inner purpose. After that, the outer purpose is just a game that you may continue to play simply because you enjoy it. It is also possible to fail completely in your outer purpose and at the same time totally succeed in your inner purpose. Or the other way round, which is actually more common: outer riches and inner poverty, or to 'gain the world and lose your soul'. Ultimately, of course, every outer purpose is doomed to 'fail' sooner or later, simply because it is subject to the law of impermanence of all things. The sooner you realise that your outer purpose cannot give you lasting fulfillment, the better. When you have seen the limitations of your outer purpose, you give up your unrealistic expectation that it should make you happy, and you make it subservient to your inner purpose."