Living up to destiny

My editor (his official title from now on) told me that I was supposed to finish the project that I was currently working on, one which – in all honesty – I had stumbled upon. And while I’m ready to talk about the project itself the implications of what this person said has stuck with me.

Often people stumble into jobs, careers or a routine and it becomes their normal life. They work 9-5 and earn their living and live their lives. There is nothing wrong with this at all and for a long time it was the destiny that faced me after I had tried my damnedest to torch my potential in my youth. Fast forward six years and I’m a mature student faced with a potential futures in academic and creative fields…. and someone is telling me that this is it; this is what I was supposed to do. This project has the potential to be one of the most important and rewarding things I ever do.

The project I’m referring to deals with subjects that I am passionate about (culture, religion, race, war, politics) and in fields which I have only recently discovered a deep reservoir of enthusiasm (imperialism, critical and cultural theory) thanks to the guidance of some special tutors at my university. Sometimes people in my family ask me why I’m writing and it comes from two deeply rooted character traits of mine. I like to help people and I like to engage with people. Living in a world that is often just wracked with conflict I want to be able to say something for the better. I guess there’s a rather egotistical reason involved to because I want to be remembered and all these things compound upon a single project that I’m meant to do. It’s odd that it’s taken me this long to blog something – because this format actually suites me quite well. Truth be told it wasn’t until I had an exchange of a few emails with another blogger that I actually saw this as a legitimate space for … randomly talking about crap I want to talk about, rather than a collection of amusing cat pictures (I’m sure I can add the odd cat picture in here and there).

The odd thing is my editor’s edict isn’t the only thing that legitimises my feelings towards my work. In an eerie turn of events I found out that I was somewhat aping my grandfather with some of my work that I was writing for assignment (something I’ll post up here soon). Someone who I rebelled against wrote a short book based in the topics and fields which I am now passionate about. Through a somewhat cathartic experience my hatred for him turned into understanding and … acceptance to a degree. I’ll never agree with everything he did but now I have root with which to try and understand why he did what he did. This understanding in turn fuels my passion and it’s all compounding upon one another. The pressure in the cooker is rising and the lid is about to blow off.

A sense of responsibility weighs heavily on a story I want to tell, a point I want to make and a challenge I wish throw out there. I have to do all this justice and that is basically the story of my entire third year of this degree, I have to do all of this justice. It’s the difference between doing something what I have always dreamed of doing – sitting on my arse and writing and living that way, or not. Either can happen, I’m not at all convinced that these turn of events guarantee success but who knows.

T