Alright. Confession time.
I’m an atheist.
I know. I know. I’m sorry you had to find out this way. If I lose reader(s) over this, I’ll understand.
The thing is, I don’t think you understand how much I wish, wish, wish I believed in some kind of After. It’s incredibly daunting to be absolutely certain in my belief that This Is It. Along those lines, I would be delighted to be proved wrong after my life on this ball we call Earth is over. Even Hell would be a kind of comfort. Sure, there’s torture. But there’s also a continuation of consciousness, which is a gift Satan/the Devil/Beelzebub/Ben Stein (whoever’s in charge) can’t take away from me.
Side Note: If Hell truly is a burning pit, then the aforementioned Evil Leader wouldn’t have to do much else to ensure my eternal torment. I hate the heat with (heh) a fiery passion. Just leave me in some humidity at a temperature above 70 degrees (Fahrenheit) and I’ll be a sweaty, angry, puddle of misery for the rest of time.
Anyway, what I’m saying is, I wish the term YOLO hadn’t been co-opted by dude-bros and Linked In Lunatics because… it’s kind of true (to me). And if you only have one life to live, well… as Clark Gable once said on the set of Casablanca, “Live, Laugh, Love.”
The way I see it, if you’re waiting for the next incarnation or some kind of After to learn how to drive stick shift, or travel the world, or watch birds through binoculars (colloquially referred to as “bird watching”), then… well… what if there isn’t an After? Maybe it’s better to try some fun stuff out now. Just in case.
As such, I have compiled a handy-dandy list of supplies and to-dos for you to begin your doing-everything journey. It’s fun! Here are the three biggest, most important rules to live by:
- Give yourself permission to try as many new things as you want. Don’t hold yourself back because you already have “enough” side projects, or you “never finish anything,” or your boss wants you to work more overtime.
- Give yourself permission to drop something the second you lose interest. Don’t think of it as “never finishing” stuff, or you “failing” at something. Think of it as that thing failing you. You’re not bad at graphic design. Graphic design is bad at being interesting and engaging! So there!
- Give yourself permission to not be perfect right away, or ever. You can enjoy doing something and be mediocre at it! These things are not mutually exclusive. The key question is: Are you enjoying it? If not, see Rule 2 above.
Recommended Supplies:
- (Optional) One (1) ADHD diagnosis
- (If possible) Smart Phone
- Libby app (and/or library card if you prefer print media)
- How to Read Literature Like a Professor by Thomas C. Foster
- Unmasking Autism by Devon Price
- How to Keep House While Drowning by KC Davis
- Modern Dried Flowers by Angela Maynard
- Stephen Biesty’s Incredible Cross-Sections of Everything Illustrated by Stephen Biesty, Written by Richard Platt
- (For people who plan to procreate or are currently expecting) Expecting Better by Emily Oster
- Calendar and/or Calendar App and/or Planner and/or Planner App
- Focus Friend, by Hank Green (Your focus friend is a bean that likes to knit.)
12. Art Supply Basics (paper, pencils, crayons, markers, ruler, scotch tape, masking tape, sharpies)
13. (If funds allow) An actual digital camera
14. A microphone that hooks up to your phone and/or computer
15. A good set of headphones and/or earbuds
16. A YouTube account
17. At least one musical instrument (marimba, ukulele, concertina, whatever suits your fancy)
18. A good therapist (I wish you the best of luck in your pursuit of this)
19. Water bottle (reusable, washable, etc. You gotta hydrate!)
20. Rain Rain app (for when you need to meditate, relax, and/or sleep more easily)
Got all that? Okay. Good. A lot of this stuff is free or reasonably priced. Yay! You can do what you want to do, even in this economy. Feel free to choose your own reading schedule, add or remove books at your discretion. Use the planner or calendar of your choosing to schedule your time and plan out the order of doing things that interest you. Or just go nuts and improvise every day if you enjoy chaos.
Remember this list is variable! Maybe you are tone deaf or just have no interest in creating music. Strike number 17 off the list. You just got really into embroidery? Time to add needles and thread to the list. You just realized you actually hate embroidery? Time to take needles and thread right back off the list.
How do you explore your interests? How do you find out all the things you potentially love to do? It’s hard to do in a country (in a world?) where the first thing we ask kids of a certain age is, “What do you want to be when you grow up?” I hate this question. Please replace it with something like, “What do you like doing?”
“What do you want to be when you grow up?” is a question that says:
- Hello, small child. Have you started thinking yet about how you will contribute in a meaningful way to the capitalist machine that is our society?
- Think only of the future. Childhood is meaningless. You’re not even a person yet. You will only have value when you are an adult.
- You can only ever be one thing.
- Once you decide on what to “be,” you are stuck with that. You can never quit, change your mind, or add another thing. (At least not without years of therapy to help you overcome the shame and feelings of inadequacy.)
- Work/Career = Life. Hobbies are for sissies.
You can be and do many things! Try looking up a university course catalog and reading through the offerings, just to give yourself an idea of all the interests that exist out there. Ask your friends what they do in their free time. (“Video games” IS a valid answer!) Take a class. Watch random tutorials on YouTube with that YouTube account you have thanks to item 16 on the above list.
Look things up. Go down a Wikipedia rabbit hole. Sit on a park bench and people watch. Start writing a novel. Start writing fifteen novels and never finish any of them. Buy a fancy journal, write three entries in it, then never add another entry. Go to your local game/comic shop and see if you can learn how to play DnD or Magic: The Gathering, maybe even join a regularly scheduled game night.
You may or may not only live once, but this is the life you happen to have right now. There’s no need to waste it, no need to confine or limit yourself based on societal expectations for how adults act, or the promise of another even better life after this one.
I have flowers drying in my craft room. Are they already dry? I don’t know! Maybe they’re drying improperly. Or I cut them wrong. But they’re there!
I have a bag of oyster shells!
The booth next to mine at the annual street fair last month was one of those pick-your-own-oyster-get-a-pearl dealios. Not only did they give me a vendor discount to pick an oyster, but they sent me home with a bag of shells. I combined two of my random hobbies to make this necklace I adore.
I made zines! Why did I make zines? Because adults deserve arts and crafts, too!
I made sourdough starter and named it Jeffrey Dough Morgan.
I tried to start a little garden in my backyard and failed SPECTACULARLY. I now have a “garden” of invasive weeds, two zinnias that managed to survive the weed invasion, and four sunflowers I didn’t plant.
My site header is a mess of tabs because I keep adding on new hobbies that I feel the need to share somewhere.
They talk about “Jack of all trades, master of none.” But they never ask what is, to me, the most important question:
Is Jack happy?
Jack deserves to live a happy life. And so do you.
Potato Lady Blogs 