Maybe in different cultures, this question is always asked, but at least in the one I’ve grown up in, this is something that’s been ingrained into everything that I do. Do something you love. Do something you want. If you don’t like it, are you at least working towards something that will get you to what you want in the end?
I have been grappling with this question for quite some time now and it’s been a very difficult process. While I may know some of the things I want, I know that I am also impressionable. If you tell me your opinion about a movie, show, etc, I will be biased by your reviews and it will become harder for me to create my own.
This also works in the same way in my life. While I believe that I want one thing, so many other people are telling me that things need to go another way and I start to doubt myself, I start to doubt whether or not what I had truly wanted was something I wanted for myself, or something that I made myself believe I wanted.
It’s hard to fully put into words, but that’s how it feels for me. Maybe it’s all in my own learning process – I need to be able to separate the other voices and try to hone into mine, without judgment, without fear, without doubt. My gut can tell me what I want and if I start to allow the other influences to muddle that up, everything gets muddled. At my core, I know what is right for me and that’s what I have to do. This is for me. This is mine. I have to own myself.
It is definitely hard to separate our own opinions from other people’s influence. But sometimes you just know if something is right for you.