8. Eggs & Baskets

Don't put all your eggs in one basket! It's a silly saying, but the thought behind it makes sense. If you put everything you value in one person, place, thing, or idea there's a chance you could lose it all. It's a really strange thought to me, because I've always envisioned people in general as having one strong, solid foundation as the basis for their beliefs and actions. That base supports and strengthens their arguments and choices. But does it make more sense to have multiple foundations that lean on one another? It seems that if one of the pieces is faulty it's less likely to make the whole structure come tumbling down.

I feel like I'm a very driven individual and for the majority of my life I've had one specific goal in mind that I strive towards. I realized recently though that it might be better to start putting my emotional eggs in separate baskets, to make my foundation out of a few pieces rather than one large one. I've had more than one big turning point in my life where I realized that single goal I was working towards wasn't what I thought it was, and it's incredibly disappointing. It's hard to manage not only the grief of the loss but then the feeling of helplessness when I realized all my expectations were gone. My expectations help determine my motivation, and my motivation is what keeps me going about my daily business.

I try to make myself the foundation of everything that I do, which makes for a very fun circular problem during a crisis. But I think I can still make myself the overall foundation if I divide up different parts of myself to rely on. I'm focusing more on work, creativity, and travel in my life. If something is going wrong in one area, I always have the others to fall back on. I'm still having a hard time sorting out the problems of foundation and motivation and circular reasoning, but it's slowly starting to make more sense to me. Most importantly, I'm doing my best to put it all into practice!

Expectations for 02/28/10: Have five new photo sets up. Have three new videos up. Have March appointment with firearms gentleman. Draw and label Betty. Bead Cthulhu charm. Don't forget to knit!