Hard concrete steps. That’s where I was when I realized the world had only one purpose. That purpose was to steal the magic that powers belief. Believing in yourself and your ability to reason and decide about your own life and who you are, that’s magic. A frustrated ten-year-old me asked my mother why the world wants to take that away sitting on those hard concrete steps. A ten-year-old that didn’t fit into the expectations of what he should be.
At times, I consider doing what is expected by the mundane. To change the way I look, how I think, what I cherish, to alter my ambitions to something more conventional. I want some of the same things as most, but I don’t want to sacrifice my core values on that altar of desire to obtain them. Free thinking becomes less valued. Iconoclasts in a left-hand path empire are handled in executory brutality. But I’m still breathing, so until the oak cracks, it will tower over the willows.
Expectations and limitations are imaginary yet powerful. When we accept the fiat value of ourselves created by others, we lose our magic. Don’t ever do that. Work hard to know yourself, understand what you want, then work hard to make that happen. It’s the only way to be.
If someone tells you to fall in line with the accepted norms, delete that parasite from your life. Keep believing in you. Don’t be afraid to step away from the mob, to free yourself from the pariah of the group mentality. The collective is the end of you, the end of beauty, and the death of joy.
Keep believing and push on. Even falling short of your dreams is better than a facile existence. Choose something more than the illusions the world sells. Conform and live the banal. Be you and live an adventure.
It’s a choice, to keep believing in the magic of self or submit to the prosaic foisted destiny of the fearful. Keep Believing. I will. I will keep writing, drawing, singing, hoping, praying, forgiving, and believing.