Purgatory

I am in purgatory. No I am not catholic, nor do I actually believe in purgatory, but if there was one, it would be my current place of residence. I just moved from Denver to Portland in hopes of pursuing my dreams and finding my niche. I left a church where I was an integral player to a city where no one knows my name but three people. I went from having purpose, vision and meaning in my life to having absolutely no idea where I am or where I am going. I am back at square one. I just got off the phone with my friend Levi and we were talking about how we are both at a crossroads in our life. He is about to graduate college and will soon enter the “workforce.” He feels like he is supposed to do something great with his life but he has no idea what that will be once he graduates. I prematurely and accidentally graduated college yesterday. I can’t go to school here for a year because out of state tuition is too expensive, and I can’t intern at Imago for another year until I prove that I can hold down what they call a “job” and “volunteer” at the church.

So for a whole year I will literally just be working a normal 9-5 full time job. I will be in purgatory. I will not be advancing my career nor will I be building a future. I will be waiting for life to happen, which is why I was going to take a year off school in the first place. I am tired of waiting for my life to begin. I just want to snap my fingers and have my career and life set out before me. I don’t want to work dead end jobs to get there because I am not even sure if I will. I wish I had some sort of direction or path to follow but I am just living. I am thinking so much that I can’t even work on my book or advance myself through my writing. So I am in purgatory. But I have to be careful because as my friend Levi says if I do not settle down somewhere I will always have a year of buildup before I can do anything. Basically it comes down to whether or not I want to stay here for three years(1 year living, 2 years interning) and experience life at Imago Dei or go somewhere else.

But if I go somewhere else I will always be in purgatory because I will never allow enough time for buildup. Part of my problem is that I want so badly to live a great life that I will always be looking around for something that is “better.” I will always be moving around until something “clicks.” I thought that I would step off the plane and I would enter nirvana. I would get to Portland and I would feel at home. People would bring me cookies and pretty girls would run up to me and kiss me on the cheek saying “Welcome to Portland!” “You finally made it home!” Then everything would fall into place and I would have my life established in the magical city of the Northwest. I would never worry about anything and everything would just feel “right.” I realize I am using a lot of “quotes” around words but that is for emphasis. I have this strange feeling that no matter where I go I will always be looking for the next best thing. I will always be looking for greener grass and a land filled with milk and honey. But I also have a strange feeling that I will never find this place. In fact I am almost guaranteed that I will never find this place because moving here is almost proof of it. I am scared of missing out on life. I am scared that I will live never have the perfect adventurous life. I am scared that after all my years on this earth I will look back and not have anything to show for it. Because of this I am frantically trying to save my life. I am anxious and worried running the streets in search of the “perfect” life. The problem with this is that will never commit to anything because I will always be looking for something else.

Portland is not that great. Neither is Denver. Neither is New York City, As long as I look at life through my utopian lens I will never be fulfilled. There will be problems everywhere I go. There will never be a place on this earth where I can hang like floatie toy in the pool, drinking margaritas without a care in the world. Everywhere I search for life I will never find it because life happens. There will always be shitty jobs and crappy bosses. There will always be something that looks better. Nothing will ever be perfect. I hope for life and am always disappointed. My favorite book in the bible is Ecclesiastes. It is by far the most relevant book in the bible. It feels so true. Everything is a circle. You will do nothing that hasn’t been done before. Everything you build has the potential to be destroyed by those who come after you. There is futility in indulgence, in work, in riches. Everything is vanity.