I used to be one of those guys, right? Thought every damn thing had to be connected, had some deep, hidden ‘meaning’. I’d spend ages, and I mean ages, trying to figure out how one thing led to another, what the universe was supposedly trying to tell me with every little coincidence. It was exhausting, to be honest.
My Old Grind: Chasing Big Meanings
So, there I was, constantly scribbling in notebooks, drawing lines between events. If something good happened, I’d go back, try to pinpoint all the “signs” that pointed to it. If something went sideways, man, I’d beat myself up something fierce, trying to work out what cosmic wire I’d tripped, what profound ‘relation’ I’d messed up. It was like living in a detective novel where I was always the clueless detective.
I clearly remember this one project I poured my heart and soul into. Worked on it day and night. I was dead sure this thing was gonna be it, my golden ticket, the project that would finally give real ‘meaning’ to all my struggles up to that point. I started seeing connections everywhere, totally convinced. A random comment from a buddy, a particular song that came on the radio, even the damn weather – I twisted it all to fit this narrative that my project was ‘in relation’ to some grand success story about to unfold.
Then Reality Kicked In
And then, bam. Life, as it often does, just pulls the rug out from under you. The project? Total flop. It didn’t just fail spectacularly; it kinda just… vanished into thin air. Poof. All those ‘connections’ I thought I’d seen? Suddenly felt like I’d just made them up. That big ‘meaning’ I’d pinned all my hopes on? Gone. Just like that.
Man, I was spinning. Totally lost my compass for a while. If that project, the one I’d loaded with so much significance, wasn’t ‘it’, then what the hell was? I remember talking to this older friend of mine, a guy who’s seen a bit more of life than me. He just sat there, listened to me rant and rave, didn’t say much at first, just let me get it all out.
Then, out of the blue, he starts telling me about his vegetable garden. Sounds daft, I know, him talking about his veggies and flowers when I’m having an existential crisis. He said he used to try and force his plants, you know? Make them grow a certain way, put them ‘in relation’ to each other strictly by what some fancy gardening book said. But they never really did well. So, he just started watching them. Really watching. Seeing what each plant actually needed, how they naturally wanted to grow. Some plants, he found, actually liked being neighbors. Others, not so much. Some just wanted their own damn space to do their thing. There wasn’t always some grand, unified plan, he said, just a lot of individual bits and pieces doing their own thing, sometimes connecting, sometimes not.
What I Started to Figure Out
That chat about his garden, it really stuck with me. I started to look at things a bit differently. Maybe this whole ‘meaning’ thing isn’t some giant treasure map where X marks the spot. Maybe it’s not always this big, dramatic thing you unearth after a struggle. Maybe it’s more about the little things you do, the small connections you make day-to-day, without trying to shoehorn them into some epic narrative.
So, I kind of eased off trying to connect every single dot. I started just doing stuff. Here’s what I mean:
- Picked up my old guitar again, just strumming whatever came to mind, no pressure for it to ‘mean’ anything.
- Helped my neighbor, old Mr. Henderson, carry his groceries up the stairs. Just ’cause.
- Actually read a book for fun, one that wasn’t promising to reveal the ‘secret meaning of life’ in ten easy steps.
And you know what? Things felt… lighter. The ‘meaning’ wasn’t some hidden thing I had to dig for; it was just sort of… there. In the doing. In just being present. It’s not like I’ve got it all figured out now. Not even close. I still catch myself, sometimes, trying to weave everything into some perfect, meaningful pattern.
But I’m getting better at just letting things be. At finding the ‘relation’ in the small moments, in the messy, everyday stuff, rather than looking for it in some grand, pre-written cosmic script. It’s more about the journey, I guess, than a perfectly plotted destination with some profound ‘meaning’ waiting at the end. It’s way messier this way, yeah, but it also feels a hell of a lot more real.
And that project? The one that crashed and burned? Took me years to see it, but I actually learned a ton from that whole mess. Not the ‘meaning’ I was desperately searching for back then, but I definitely picked up some skills, learned about bouncing back. And those things, surprisingly, turned out to be pretty damn meaningful in their own right. The ‘relation’ was there all along, just not the one I was trying to force.
