Aspiration, entitlement & other trappings of living in the future

I started the journey home, content to sit in silence and give myself the space to try and get things to sink in a bit. Three things were on my mind. The first was talking to my wife who I suddenly felt as though I had let down in a way that I never thought would be possible, it was a dreadful feeling. The second was just how staggeringly beautiful the world was. It had been a nice drive through the country on the way, but the same route on the way back revealed treasures, hidden depths and jaw dropping scenery that was so perfect it almost hurt my eyes to look at. I’ve read that people who think they are going to die sometimes feel like this, but experiencing it first hand genuinely took my breath away - it was really as though I’d never bothered to look at things properly before and a whole new level of reality revealed itself to me, easily and willingly; it was absolutely magical. The third set of thoughts were about my kids. Initially I started to think about how horrible it might be for them if they had to grow up without a Dad and how they wouldn’t be able to take the ‘benefit’ of a Dad by their side to look after them. I thought that I felt angry and betrayed that I might be made to abandon them and have the responsibility that was mine alone to bear robbed from under me. The more I thought about it though, the more I was forced to admit to myself that it wasn’t so much them I was worrying about but more about myself. The truth was that I actually felt entitled to be their Dad, to see them grow up and to be a part of their lives. I felt robbed of something that I deserved, a right just by existing. I was thinking about my daughter and son who at 18 would likely see me as pretty much irrelevant to who they were and where they might be going and it was almost impossible to bear. It made me think back a few months where I’ve been asked to complete an interview for a magazine at work - one of those ‘getting know know team-members’ things, and one of the questions had been “what is your pet business peeve?” I had listed ‘entitlement’ as a behavior that I particularly disliked, and what I had mean’t by that was that I disliked people who thought they were entitled to something without demonstrating the capability, commitment and passion that would enable them to ‘earn’ whatever it was they thought they were entitled to. In that moment though, I realized that entitlement was nothing to do with whether you ‘earned’ something or not - certainly, I felt that I had at least tried to demonstrate capability, commitment and passion to being a Dad. In fact, having a sense of entitlement comes instead from living your life in the future. I had spent my entire life living in the future - I hardly ever thought about the past or the present, always on would will be and what might be. In that moment I realized that living in the future creates aspiration, desire, anticipation and entitlement… are these things good? I wondered if that is actually just a manifestation of selfish personal capitalism? I wasn’t entitled to be my kids Dad anymore that I was entitled to be alive tomorrow, next week or next year. The truth is that no one is actually entitled to a single god damn thing. At that moment I decided to make a pledge - I was going to stop living in the future and start living in the moment. I had a strong feeling that not only would be make me a better person, I would likely be the only way I would be manage to cope over the next period of my life. Go here to the start of the journey. Go here for next blog entry. Go here for previous blog entry.