Jim Jones-ified

Where do I fit in- isn't that what we are all searching for? I belong to ______college, ______club, _______sports team. What if you have been looking (for years) for that one thing you can say, "yes that's who I am, that's what I am". This my friends is what happens in your late 20's....unmarried, childless. Not that those things define you, but in your late 20's it's hard enough to make people stop asking "what's going on" with you. Now, I consider myself to be independent, liberated, modern in every sense of the word. But why is it that I have to keep measuring myself by my relationship status and number of children I'm bearing.

I've recently convinced myself that these are the things that will make me happy. A house in the suburbs (I just bought one...alone), a husband and a child...or two(in theory). According to the masses I am well on my way to happiness....but, what happens when your heart lies in a job 70 miles from your newly furnished home, the man you love's parents only got married a few years ago (they have been together for like 40 years and have 4 children), and you're not willing to compromise your lifestyle for a dog? It seems like I might need a new/different recipe for happiness.

This revelation happened at an odd time. It came to me after watching some dateline special about Jim Jones and his crazy church were "everyone is equal...colors don't matter, let's all eat the communal rice." I actually bought into this theory. I believed there could be a utopia on this earth. That people could live free from hunger, politics, racism, sexism, class ism.... we all could just get along! And then- they drank the kool aid. All 900 of them. Cut to a helicopter aerial shot of 900 dead bodies. But these people believed! How could it end like this? Me- sad- devastated. I turned to O and asked the same question, "how could that many people believe in something Jim said was suppose to be so good?" His response "they were brainwashed". Bam!- life revelation. Have people been telling me what's going to make me happy, or did I come up with that on my own? Just like that, I was Jim Jones-ified.

Was I really though?- that's what this blog is about. Trying to navigate through the advice, the insight, and hear say that always makes it's way to our subconscious. Welcome to my journey, my meditations on life.