If you read the title, you have a wealth of references from your own life in your mind right now. Teachers disciplining you telling you "in the real world, you'd never get away with that," or parents telling you "in the real world, no one's going to do this for you," or "appreciate that now because you will have to stop that when you get to the real world." When you're young, there is an unsaid "when I get to the real world I'll..." followed by idealistic Big Hairy Audacious Goals and convincing rationalizations that you will be able to do things better than the adults doing them right now.
For some, they are very aware when they enter the "real world". They get to university, they get their first job, they hear their first "I love you", they get married, or they buy real estate. The list I just made potentially spans a great deal of time. One, maybe two decades. How can the real world start at such different times for everyone? How can it involve so many different start lines?
Maybe it's a hoax. Perhaps the real world doesn't have a start line. Could it be a mindset? We all have to do our taxes and find a way to pay for the roof over our heads, but that doesn't automatically mean we have to get serious all of a sudden. Keeping those audacious dreams alive could be the key to traveling between realms. When I was young, not yet a recognized member of the real world, traveling between realms, between kingdoms, and between universes was a daily occurrence. Imagine what life would be like if none of us had that fateful moment when we realized the Tooth Fairy didn't exist. Adults would have a very different way of talking about the real world.
So, if it is only a mindset, why do we feel forced to grow up? Why can't we keep being a kid in the real world? Why can't we keep those goals and limitless dreams? I have struggled to answer this question for many years, and have finally reached an answer. I have removed this question from my list of stressors by deciding the question itself is flawed. This question suggests there is a real world that is universally defined and that is a fallacy. I can do my taxes and still follow childhood dreams of writing a book. I can hold down a steady job to fund my rent payments while still going and splashing in puddles at the beach in the rain. I can build and hold a romantic relationship and still eat pancakes for dinner. On a daily basis, I can have one foot in each realm, suggesting that the real world is not a place that must exist in a mutually exclusive way with childhood dreamland.
Since this thought dawned on me last year, I have noticed that more fun has worked its way into my life. Just as the school bell would ring and I would run out to the playground, I now close my laptop at the end of a workday and run outside to play in the forest or hop in the car to drive to the ski hill to play in fresh powder, or I stay inside working on an epic art project with pencil crayons. I am shaping my life with purpose, so I can follow the dreams of an idealist child yet still join all the "real" adults at the office.
A positive side effect of me pushing my life in this direction is that I have noticed new friends and old friends flocking into my life so we can play together. We abandon the real world the moment we step out of the office into the fresh air of evening or weekend freedom and travel into the realm of the living world. We are all living to find laughter and joy together, and are all kinder, more loyal, and less stressed people because of it. One friend started a cooking photography blog because she absolutely lives for food, and was picked up by a major food delivery service as an official photographer. Another started his own rock band and plays live shows for huge crowds, opening for a few big-name 1970's and 1980's bands. Yet another started writing her own sitcom to capture the funniest and most out-there moments in the lives of the hospitality industry and is working with a producer at Amazon. We all have day jobs, we all pay rent and taxes. However, our lives have become so much richer in the last few years because we support each other in shutting the real world in a closet for a little while every day.
Don't let the real world get in the way of the living world. Shape your world as your ten-year-old self would have wanted it. It will be more fun that way. As John Mayer said, "There's no such thing as a real world//Just a lie we have to rise above" (No Such Thing).
Title inspired by John Mayer, No Such Thing.
Comentários