pick me up, love

3/24/07

I am finding that it doesn’t matter where you are when it comes to dealing with life and people and things. It doesn’t matter what city you’re in, what state you’re in, or even what country you’re in. The thing that does matter is that you’re the one who is living in that city, or residing in that state, or within that country’s borders. Where you are doesn’t change what’s going on in your life. It doesn’t change the fact that there are difficult people you’re going to have to deal with, or the fact that there are going to be hard issues that come up, forcing you to make big decisions and think much more than you’d really like to. Your location is temporary, really. Just like most relationships and friendships, jobs, and other things of this world that all people have, naturally. Locations change, people change, your situation changes- but you’re always going to have relationship problems, and hopefully, resolutions that come after the problems. You’re always going to have hard situations come up. Maybe it’s a health disorder, maybe it’s a career decision, or maybe it’s a moral issue. Whatever it is, it will stay with you no matter how many places you move, no matter how many cities you leave, and no matter how many new cities you arrive in. It doesn’t matter how many “vacations” you take, whether it be a cruise out of the country, or just a couple hundred miles away from your place of residence at that time. You can try to escape your problems, you can try to get away from certain people, you can try to move on from reputations you want to leave in the past… but you can never really escape, you can never really get away for good, and you can never truly move on and leave things in the past. Unless… YOU make a change, on the inside. It’s not the places you go to solve an issue, it’s not where you are when problems arise, it’s what goes on inside of your head and inside your heart that matter. Because, the fact is, you can never really escape yourself. You are you, and you’re always going to be you. Things about you can change, of course, but at the end of the day you’re still you. You are the one that’s in one city today and you’re also the one in the next city tomorrow- the common factor in all of these is the “you.” It’s not what goes on around you that matters in the end, it’s you. It’s what is going on inside of you. Your surroundings have significant affects on your life, as well as the people you surround yourself with, and what you do with your surroundings. They all affect you somehow. But I’m finding that, in the end, none of those things truly change you without something inside of you changing first. Maybe changing your location is something that gives you a fresh perspective. Maybe you spend most of your life in the Midwest, experiencing harsh winters and heated summers. Maybe just getting up and leaving for a white, sandy beach in Florida or the coast of North Carolina is just the change you need to get a refreshed outlook on your life. Sure. But I guarantee you will eventually return to your place in the Midwest and find that spending a week in Florida didn’t actually change your life. The only way that would really happen is if the change in location sparked a change inside of you, which then kept changing when you returned from the trip. The process is ongoing, and you can only be truly different if what was inside of you changes and passes the test of time. Your environment only matters to an extent. So with that said, I end with a wonderful cliché: It’s not the outside, but the inside that matters.