It’s not an easy thing to do.
It’s not like online shopping where you can browse items, add them to basket, and review the items at the checkout before you pick your favourite one. But, oddly enough, it is similar to clothes shopping.
It’s very easy to mentally try on priorities, to see if I suit this new definition. To twist this image of my around so as to examine it better, and to see if I really, truly, love it.
But first of all, I need to figure out what I want. Or what I don’t want, as sometimes that’s easier.
I know I don’t want a dramatic change.
This isn’t a new year’s resolution, where I’m imagining myself walking out my door and OHMYGOSH WHO IS THIS NEW GIRL TO STEP INTO THE WORLD? I’ve had those before, of course, but right now I’m generally quite happy with who I am and how I am perceived.
I want a subtle change, something only me and my close friends will notice after a while.
Well, that makes it easier for myself. Maybe all I need to do is switch my priorities around. Or to not label my priorities at all, but just figure out what I want in life.
Love. That’s obvious, I know I’ve wanted that since I was 14. And I cannot change that this will always be one of the most important things to me. My main beliefs and values are rooted in this want. As I said, I want a subtle change. So this want can stay.
Breaking it down though, how important is each aspect to me, right now?
- Friendship Love: Extremely important. Although, not the most important as I feel I have it in abundance. I would always like more, of course, but I’m incredibly grateful for the amount I have. Plus I’m confident in my ability to gain more. How much you want something is often very dependent on how attainable it is. As I feel this is attainable, I don’t yearn for it too much.
- Romantic Love: As of 6 months ago, the most important thing to me. I want this desire to lessen because it’s taken over me too much, and cultivates my mind to a point I have little room for other things. Plus, I know, that the less I want this, the more likely I am to get it (thank you, G-d, for that wonderful paradox, I honestly do admire your sense of irony). I also feel far more confident in getting this now than I did 6 months ago, yet not the most confident in the world, but I know dwelling on it is a flaw I have. So I think I’ll be killing about 3 or 4 birds with one stone by moving this priority lower. Or replacing it with something else, which is probably a more realistic solution.
- Family Love: I am incredibly lucky to never have to worry about this, as my parents have created a far warmer environment than I could ever ask for. Although I’m moving out next year for University (please G-d), so I do want to raise this priority higher as a thank you to them, and to make sure I have no regrets when I leave.
- The Love from Strangers: Something very different to Respect from Strangers, which comes from creating something admirable. Love is an emotion, so is extremely personal, and is only created when I reach out to someone in a specific way, and change their emotions. This could be from an act of kindness, making someone smile, listening to someone who needed help, replying to a post online declaring sadness, helping someone in school either physically or emotionally. Most people would define this as simply “being a good person”. But I like to break things down, because I find things easier to understand that way. But, yes, I want to make this a higher priority, because too often am I lost in some daydream that I don’t notice those around me, and miss out on gaining love from a stranger. Or to make someone’s day better.
Respect. As mentioned above, this is different from Love. This doesn’t get someone personally involved, but simply lets them admire you, or your talents. And I too often forget that having respect can be almost as important as having love. To have love, it shows you’ve left your mark on a person. To have respect, it shows you’ve left your mark on the world.
And when I die, I don’t only want to be known as “the girl who was touched many people’s hearts”, but also as the girl who inspired, who fired up people’s minds as well. The girl who changed the world by making everyone she knew feel loved AND by making people she didn’t know feel mentally stimulated.
Maybe that should be the basis for my new priority. To be Respected. To be Admired. To be Inspiring.
Well, no, not the last one. You don’t inspire people by TRYING to inspire them. Inspiration is just the dust that rubs off of your creation, and lingers on the people that passed by it. It is not the creation itself.
But somehow, being defined as “the girl who I respect” doesn’t fit me well. Like a dress the wrong size, it hangs oddly on me, and I don’t feel snug in it.
What I do like is “the writer”, but I can’t really AIM to be a writer, as that’s more of by-product of having ideas seeping out of me. When I was “the hopeless romantic” I was still, somewhat, a writer (but less), but everything I wrote was about Love. About Him. “The Hopeless Romantic” is a definition which fits a lot like a pair of very high heels - it feels great and you feel it makes you look INCREDIBLE…until you wear it for a long while and it starts to hurt, until it’s hindering you from even moving forward.
However, what I DO like, though, is “the girl who makes a proactive contribution”. A bit of a mouthful, yes, but I like it. I like the image I get when I have this as my top priority. “Proactive contribution” seems like a weird phrase at first, but it’s more than just a “positive contribution”, which you don’t always need to think about much to do. A “proactive” one, however, is one that requires thought. I want to be the girl who thinking about how she can better the world.
I want to leave a mark on my school in my last year.
Yeah. I think that’s a reasonable goal. It’s not easy, but it’s realistic. Plus it’s far more attainable and less vague than “I want to leave a mark on the world”.
This will be my new Top Priority. To make a Proactive Contribution, with specific focus on my school.
Which fits beautifully with the mental health movement I wanted to start with a friend of mine, but was always too distracted to do it :)
Many people say we try to categorise and define ourselves too much, and sometimes these people are right. But I know myself, and I know I need to define myself, else my thoughts will run free and I’ll start to daydream (something which always takes me 2 steps backwards).
So this is me. The girl who wants to make a proactive change to her surroundings :)
(But also wants to be loved by friends, family, strangers, and someone special. And enjoys writing and listening to music and reading and parties and clubbing and being a teenager.)
