Happiness

I want to share something with everyone today that I think we’ve missed out on in our society. In this country, and most places I’m sure, we tell our children they can be anything they want. They believe it, too. It’s amazing to watch them dream in ways that we can barely even remember dreaming. They’re hopeful for a future where they can be like their heroes. There’s just one problem with our statement. It’s a lie. They can’t be anything they want. I know. It’s a hard concept for some people to grasp, but if your kid grows up to be 5’6”, odds are they will never be an NBA player, and without an education from a top tier school and a lot of money, they’ll never be president either. To make a long story short, we are predisposed to a certain kind of life based on biology and the situation we’re born into. Now, I’m not saying we don’t have control of some things because we certainly do, but you can’t be just anything.

Let me share my personal experience with you. When I was 2, for some reason, I wanted to be the garbage man. It turns out where I live you have to be a prisoner to pick up garbage, so that’s not happening. When I was 9, I decided I wanted to be an NFL quarterback like my hero Brett Favre. I wanted to make millions and be someone else’s hero. Then when I was 12, I wanted to be a doctor. I didn’t know how much med school cost at the time. In my 20s, I decided to write books. I wanted to sale millions. Do you see a trend here? Almost all of it involves a career where I make a lot of money, and none of it is really me. That’s not to say I don’t like many of the things on the list, but who I am doesn’t lie in those dreams. I could never commit a crime big enough to land me in prison. I wouldn’t last two seconds in the joint. ;) While I can read a defense pretty well, I don’t have the monstrously large hands of most NFL quarterbacks, so that dream was never realistic. I didn’t want to spend my life paying off student loans, and honestly, being a surgeon would have been a horrible career choice. I’ve never had steady hands. Finally, there are the millions I want to sale in books. Don’t get me wrong. I still want those millions, and if you want to make me a millionaire, I’m on board with that, but I don’t really write books for the masses. I write things I enjoy and think only of that. I think most writers who are extremely successful write to their audience’s taste, and I’m not saying I don’t think of my readers, but I like to write things that keep me on the edge of my seat. It’s about enjoyment in my alone time as a writer more than it’s about the check at the end of it all. I’ll probably never be a millionaire. To most people that might sound like I’m giving up on a dream, but I’m really not because it was never my dream. I thought as a kid, I could be that doctor, Brett Favre, or for some reason my local garbage man in Sledge. As an adult, people said “you could be John Grisham. He was from here.” I failed miserably at trying to be anything other than me, however.

There’s a silver lining to all of this. Lately, I’ve been figuring out who I am. I’ve been embracing the nerdy side of myself and reading books that I can nerd out over. I’ve been playing the games I love instead of the ones my friends do, and I’ve been watching television shows that aren’t as popular as the ones everyone says I should be watching. I’ve also been writing two new series that won’t be ready until 2017, which are exactly what I want to write. They’re complicated and out there at times. I don’t know if they will be everyone’s cup of tea or not, but I know I’m enjoying the journey of these new books more than I’ve enjoyed anything in a long time. I’m becoming myself. I’m not watching the shows my family and friends are, and I’m not worried about if what I’m reading or playing is considered “nerdy.” I’m certainly not trying to be someone else either. I don’t want to be a professional football player who gets pounded daily, and I don’t want to be a doctor. I certainly don’t want to be John Grisham, no offense to him. He does a good job of being him, but I’ve got different stories to tell, and I write and live each day for so much more than money. For me, none of this is about business or fame. It’s about enjoying every moment of life. It’s about embracing who I am and proudly showing anyone who wants to see, no matter what the results are.

So what do I think we should tell our children? I think instead of telling them you can be anything you want and then introducing them to heroes who play sports and write stories, we should tell them you don’t have to decide what you want to be when you grow up. You just have to keep being you. That will lead to a career, happiness, and a certain pride that none of us seem to have in ourselves. We measure our worth in money, cars, and how big our houses are. The stuff defines us. We value ourselves based on what we have. We never think is this who I am. Is that what I was born to do? Is this where I want to be? Am I even reading the books and watching the movies that I want to? Am I just a reflection of what I think I ought to be because someone convinced me I should be like someone else? Life comes down to one simple word at the end - memories. What do yours say about you, and what do you want your children’s to be? Do you want the memories to be filled with jobs they didn’t care about, a need to always impress, and a never-ending need to be like someone else? I don’t want that, and I’m finding that happiness is the simplest thing in the world. It isn’t about having more money, a nicer car, or even the perfect girl. It’s about not wasting your days on chasing someone else’s dream. What makes you happy? Identify it, and then chase it. You can’t be just anything, and most of us will never be rich or famous. Accepting who you are is the key to happiness because once you’re okay with it, you start to become the hero in your story as you identify your strengths and turn them into a life full of open doors instead of closed ones.