Never get comfortable

Lately I've been thinking a lot about personal growth. I often find I am fixated on "bettering" myself - but my definition of better in the past few years was thinner, prettier, leaner and so on and so forth. While I spent so much time thinking about those changes I was failing to change really anything of substance about myself. I remained insecure, impressionable and unquestioning.

Last fall, post-divorce, I realized that I could either give in to the idea that I was a failure and a divorce was the worst possible thing in the world, or I could change. I could change my attitude, my outlook, my expectations, my goals and my future.

Now it didn't happen overnight. I would wax and wane between feeling positive and crying into a bottle of wine. But eventually I started on a quest of change. So much of my marriage had consisted of me compromising who I was as a person to pursue the "American dream" of a high paying job and social status that I had forgotten what it was to think outside the norms of our society. I started reading again - about ethics, mortality, atheism, science (well I am always reading science), feminism, anarchism, self worth, sociology.... And I've learned so much, and I keep on learning so much.

It seems that after a certain point in life, or one reaches a certain age, there is no emphasis on personal growth. I want to always keep growing, changing, and learning. Part of this came to mind as I started formulating a personal statement of sorts. And I think I've settled on my theme; about constantly learning, constantly experimenting, revising hypotheses and how that applies to life as much as it applies to chemistry. And that for everything I have learned there is so much more that I don't know.

So, to borrow a phrase from Scott; never get comfortable.