Missing Out
Have you ever felt like you missed out on something? I get that feeling all the time. I can be walking along, or just thinking, and suddenly something will appear and I go “damn, I missed something important.” It’s not that good of a feeling.
It the feeling itself wasn’t enough, it can lead to the greatest torture ever invented: the question “what if?”
What if I had just done it that way instead of this way?
What if I had spoken up instead of staying silent?
What if I hadn’t done that?
I can get lost in those sometimes. I can look at a situation from so many different perspectives and try to figure out the answer. The fact of the matter is, though, that it’s an impossible quest. If it was just me, it wouldn’t be a problem, answering those questions. Well, if it was just me, those questions wouldn’t be important. It’s the ’social’ impact that changes things. I call it social because I can’t find a better word.
Basically, it’s the idea that other people are involved. People are fundamentally unpredictable. Sure, you can have a general idea about how someone might act, but there are far too many variables to come up with a firm solution.
It’s a pointless exercise, anyway. Answering the question doesn’t do much, except perhaps provide some ideas as to what might be changed in the future. Even that, though, it formed more than our enviroment and nature than it is a personal choice. Rare cases exist where this is not true, but they are just that: Rare.
It is true, however, that we can choose – to a certain extent – the enviroment that we conduct our lives, so in that sense, it is our choice how to react.
God, this is a complicated problem.
The fact remains: we are the product of the choices we make. This means the next time someone asks if I want to go to a party, I’ll probably say no. I’ll do this because I don’t care for alcohol that much, and I’m completely lost in the social aspect of things. So I’ll miss out on that.
The next time I’m asked to go to a lecture, or meeting, or anything like that I’ll refuse for the same reason. There is nothing like going to something like that and knowing that the only way to survive is through finding someplace quiet to pass the time once there.
Why does it have to be this complicated?
They say you can always change, and I want to agree. Now, though, I’m not so sure that I can. I’ve read the books, taken the classes, experimented, and have always ended up the same as I am now. Knowledge is not power – the ability and willingness to apply it is.
I wish it was cheaper to go bowling.
