This is my first time since starting this blog that I went longer than a month without posting. October was busy, with group projects, birthday celebrations, Halloween preparations, and networking events. I could have posted about the conference I went to early in the month, the PR+Social Media Summit. I listened to a ton of speakers and learned a lot about being a more effective communicator. I even ate lunch with one of the keynote speakers, Augie Ray, and talked about marketing, social media, careers, etc. But I didn't post about that.
I could have written about applying for a teaching job in China and getting turned down. I could have talked about how discouraging that was for me, but also how it opened up new possibilities for me. I've rearranged some things so that my eggs aren't all in one basket. I'm a lot less stressed in a weird way, even though I have a lot less certainty and a lot more work to do. But I didn't post about that, either.
Instead, I kept silent. I did my homework and marathoned a few (or more than a few) episodes of Buffy the Vampire Slayer and turned 22 and spent time with my friends. I never consciously told myself I wouldn't post in October, but I'm kind of glad I didn't. It wasn't necessarily that I needed a break, but I did need a change in routine. I have a tendency to want rigid structure, but once I have it, I need to break free. This little disruption freaked me out at first, but now, even as I write, I realize how healthy it was.
The older I get, the more things I become involved in, the more I come to understand that life is not lived on a strict schedule. It's lived in those moments between the meetings and the classes. It's lived on the bus, in the coffee shop, walking down the street. I live in those seconds when I don't think about what I need to do or what someone else wants me to do. I live when I am just content in my own skin.
I recognize that responsibilities are important, and I've never been one to shirk them. I never will be. I love working toward a goal and meeting deadlines. I love the little adrenaline rush you get when you finish that project you've been working on so diligently. I love being there for people and having them count on me. But I also love breaking the rules sometimes. I love putting my necklace on backwards and sleeping in late.
I can be the rule follower and the rule breaker. I can be the perfectionist and the sloth. I can be stressed out and carefree. I can be all these things and more because life is too short not to be.
