For When You Lose Interest in the Things You Used to Enjoy

You just packed it up into a box—perhaps you’ll need it later. Amazed at how small a box can hold 10,000+ hours’ worth of your efforts, you feel a tinge of regret. You want to still be interested in it—but aren’t. Faced with the choice between a novel endeavor and a farce of feigned interest, you choose novelty.

Daydreaming, you become a reluctant buddha. Looking behind, you see the wide river and the raft you wove for many months to cross it. At this point, that raft could only take you backwards. And you look forward, glancing upon a simple trail into the mist with a few glimmers of sunlight peeking through… a future of pure glistening uncertainty.

Hence the koan of personal growth—at the far edge of life, on the other side of your goals and transitions, who are you? Every so often the “you” built around a career, a marriage, some interests, and whatever else evaporates into the thin air that is its essence—to then arise anew and unburdened for journeys yet to be imagined.

You label the box and shut the storage room door. It meant so much to you, and yet your meaning lies elsewhere now. Your heart pulsates with emptiness and evolution; each outbreath stirring the dust accumulating on who you were. You have grown again: Who are you now?