Reflections on Identity

Sometimes I feel like the same person I was just a few months ago and other times I feel completely different.  I just read this morning that identity lags reality by 1-2 years.  This from Mark Manson.  It’s an interesting thought.  Maybe gives credence to the idea that a habit takes a lot longer to form than just 30 days or whatever the quoted standard is.  I recently moved into a new home and I still feel tethered to my old way a life.  It’s a new state and a new home, daughter is older, closer to family…a lot of change.  Perhaps after a year of living here, combined with my other life adjustments I’m trying to implement (reduced caloric intake, wearing better clothes, establish an evening routine to improve sleep) I’ll really begin to feel like a new person.  My base will be elevated.  Sometimes I feel sad remembering my life in my old state and other times I feel happy and excited about our future in our new state.  “The only constant is change.”  It’s one of my favorite quotes.  I’ve always been a thinker but it’s safe to say that for the past 5 years or so I’ve really given thought to life, to existence, purpose, meaning, “practical philosophy”, time management, and more.  Do I have any answers?  Maybe snippets here and there.  But it’s not about answers, its about the thinking, for that is what an entity with a brain does.  And I shall continue to think and pull on the strings of life till the day I die.  One of my axioms I want to establish is: keep it simple.  Another one: action over planning.  And another, off the cuff: Gratitude over ambition.  This thing we call “life” really is a beautiful thing we get to experience, and it’s up to us, individually, to choose how we want to experience it…

Hmmm…

…after thinking about it, while I do believe everyone has a conscious choice on how they perceive life, I acknowledge that we all experience life differently.  That’s a whole other topic, one in which we delve into the world being gray, and not black and white.