I sat around last night envisioning myself on death’s door. What? Oh, sure, like I’m the only one who plays out morbid scenarios in their mind occasionally. Every once in a while, my subconscious shouts “hey, we’re gonna die someday. Wonder how that’ll play out?” and, being the overly creative fellow that I am, I oblige my psyche by fleshing out the grisly details. Did you know that Anthony Burgess, the author of “A Clockwork Orange”, was once diagnosed with terminal cancer and wrote 5 books in ONE YEAR so that his wife would have some kind of money after he kicked off. (As an aside, he got better from the terminal cancer). With that story for source material, and my ongoing unhappiness with my own work ethic, my imagination took off.

Last night’s mortality scenario included a prolonged stay in a hospital room where I was feverishly churning out new writing in a race against the clock. The small sense of pride that came from the idea of working hard in the face of death was an awkward sensation. Have to find the upside to everything,

But then I paused my daydream to give myself a reality check. Maybe, I’d be a little bit happier in the here and now if I put a little more effort into working while I wasn’t on my deathbed. To use an automotive metaphor, I am a car in 1st gear trying to go up a hill. Other cars are passing me because they are working harder. I’m content to putter up the hill because the road isn’t collapsing behind me, and the light at the top of the hill is going to stay green forever. But it’s not.

I know, I know, “time is short” is not a revelatory statement. You have to make do with what you have and get your priorities straight. That’s where my troubles lie. I’m wired to prioritize pleasure and comfort instead of meaningful work. Something from a long time ago, probably during childhood, convinced me that happiness and nice things are going to disappear, so I gorge on them. I eat every meal like a fatter, hungrier man is on his way to eat my food. I hate to pause a video game and leave the room for fear of it vanishing before I return.

So that’s where the scarcity confusion is, and where I need to put in some work. No one is coming to take my happiness away. There will be plenty of time for fun, I promise, but there are books to write first.(and laundry and dishes and vacuuming and volunteering).

Opportunity Cost: the loss of potential gain from other alternatives when one alternative is chosen.

What an interesting last 5 years it has been for me. You’ve been able to follow along my adventure here in the blog, as I discovered new possibilities and chased what must have seen at times as wildly divergent goals. It’s like I woke up after decades of dozing to realize that I had a lot more to offer the world than I thought, and still had time to do something about it.

So I started jumping at every chance that came by. I wanted to make a difference wherever anyone would let me. That’s an important distinction to make: I still felt, deep down, that I wasn’t really that useful (thanks, shoddy self-esteem) so I had to desperately leap at every opportunity.

I don’t want to mislead you into thinking that I haven’t found most of these volunteer efforts rewarding and educational, though. I have met fantastic people and experienced some real revelatory moments during the 5 year ‘say yes to everything’ binge. I’ve been part of some great teams, and I’ve finally become comfortable in the knowledge that my contribution to the team makes a difference.

But there have been a few less than stellar moments of frustration and fatigue. I’ve found myself in a few meetings torn between a guilty sense of not doing enough, and a profound desire to not take on any more work. It isn’t a fun internal conflict to manage. I felt pulled in a million directions without and sense of making progress. I was tired and unenthusiastic about my commitments.

The problem recently extended into my creative life. I had a handful of projects I could work on, and I started picking away at all of them, seemingly at random. One of the projects was a one-act play that I intended to stage in our Fringe festival next year. I wrote it up and did a read through with a friend of mine. later that night, as I started to compile the full list of all the work necessary to bring the script to the stage, I finally asked myself an important question: is producing this play going to move me closer to my goals? More importantly, what are my goals?

And lo! A bright light shone in my mind,  and clarity came storming in. As soon as I chose a goal (actually, a couple of them) I could now measure each opportunity against the cost to my progression. I stopped saying yes just because I could do it. I sat down and reviewed all of my standing commitments and asked “does this move me towards my goals? Is it a good fit for my life and am I a good fit for the organization?”. It was surprisingly hard to be so ruthlessly objective. I hate quitting anything, and I doubly hate letting anyone down. But I made a cut list, and I narrowed down my efforts. In the upcoming weeks, I’ll start looking at a couple of new opportunities, and they will have to meet the same criteria. I’m a talented guy but time is short and I have to make the most of it.

Birthdays have not traditionally been an enjoyable event for me. There has been a consistent sense of anxiety as the day approaches, a feeling that only intensified once the actual day started. It would all begin to escalate with a simple question “what do you want for your birthday?” This question honestly flummoxed me each and every time. In my heart of hearts, I didn’t know what actions or gifts would give me a happy birthday. I wanted to be happy, I really did, but I could not identify how to make that happen. Cue the stress, the irritation, and the depression.

There was a change this year. I found out how to be happy on my birthday (and possibly happy all the time). I can’t put my finger on the exact catalyst for this change, but there were a few things that stuck in my mind. The public (social media) birthday wishes from a few of my dear family members made mention of how creative I was and how they were excited for what I would create in upcoming year: my wife’s message was the perfect example of this. And my sister-in-law in Thunder Bay let me know that her 9-year-old had confiscated my novels from his mom so that he could read them himself, and he was chewing through the books with a voracious literary appetite.

It’s very important to note that my friends and family have always been supportive, more so than I’ve ever really acknowledged. And that’s the big change, the present I gave myself: I acknowledged that I have these wonderful people cheering me on. For the first time in my life (or as far as I can remember) I accepted the fact that I am loved and supported. By simply believing that, my birthday became one of real celebration. I didn’t need to spend the day hoping for proof or validation. My emotional foundation was set. My family loves me, my friends care for me, and I’m happy with who I am. The stress that usually haunts every minute of August 20 vanished. It was replaced by a calm optimism and joy. It’s pretty amazing.