Question 1: When can I stop working on self-improvement?
Answer 1: Never. Never, never. Never, ever.
Confession: I am so tired of self-improvement. For the last several years I have been on one self-betterment project after another. Truth is, it has been longer than that. When I was in college, I spent a good deal of time trying to overcome personal obsessions. I tried religion, therapy, friendships, food diaries and exercise plans. I wanted to be a better person. I wanted to stop telling lies--to myself and to others. I wanted to stop hiding behind 100 pounds of excess fat. I wanted to stop stuffing myself with food. I wanted to learn to be kind to others and to encourage people in concrete ways. I wanted to become someone's mate, and a good one, at that. I accomplished some of my goals. More often, I made inroads and realized that I would never quite master my inner demons.After that, I embarked on a journey of professional self-improvement. Actually, it was more like adding an additional layer to my established self-betterment goals. I started going to school again. I began working up a perpetually lengthening career ladder. Personal setbacks often hampered my professional progress by giving me excuses to delay taking classes. Often I would procrastinate for months before requesting and submitting the right paperwork to complete my next education step. I took out a $10,000 loan for a Master's program I then let a stupid, selfish man convince me I could not complete. After that, I let an educational "professional" convince me not to try to continue the program because of a perceived opinion that my courses would not transfer to another school. I switched my focus to my current job so that I might at least attain better training in the profession that paid my bills, and discovered that I could not start a new program without extensive pre-requisite training and college credits I didn't get in my bachelor's degree program. So I started taking classes, one at a time.
While this was going on, my personal life saw some dramatic improvements. I saw more flaws come out in the bright light of the desire to love a worthy person, and learned lessons in humility and interdependence. My health began to deteriorate in the shadow of these other great works, and so I again tackled my food and exercise problems. Every time I tried to bring another category of goals into the mix, the others suffered. I could not juggle them all. I forgot things. I obsessed over details. I wore myself out trying to remember everything and went through periods of total stagnancy in all areas. I began programming my life and commitments into my smart phone calendar to keep track of them all, and keeping detailed notes on financial due dates so that I would not forget to pay my bills. I tried to make friends and improve my social skills when I recognized the need for a support system, but consistently failed to remember events I'd committed to and often struggled with apathy towards the people I'd tried to get to know. I realized how much I needed and cherished down-time. I realized how much I wanted to be alone, and how little need I have for social interaction. Even in that realization, I saw a challenge; the world does not tolerate the un-social very well. I would have to keep trying to be better than I was, and it would never, ever stop.
Question 2: Why the hell not?
Answer 2: I don't know.
I guess it's because stopping means dying that much quicker. Stopping means being passed over for promotions and that means being supervised in my job by people who are less capable and intelligent than I, and that means bitterness and anger when I go to work. Stopping means letting myself be mean to people I love because I won't think hard enough about improving my verbal filter. Stopping means giving up on being worthy of my husband's adoration. Stopping means not being able to get off the couch without grunting, and not being able to walk up the stairs at work or see the wilderness at a state park. Stopping means eventually needing a seat extender on airplanes and not being able to run alongside a child's bike. Stopping means giving up, and I am already so good at that, I don't need any more practice.Right now, I want so hard just to curl up with a book and a latte, and just say "fuck off" to the online class I am desperately trying to keep up with. I want to empty out my gym bag for good, pack up all my gear in the spare room and just say "no more" to the massive body aches I have right now from my workout yesterday. I want to forget about eating healthy because I am overwhelmed by even the thought of grocery shopping for good food. I want to forget about pesticides and just buy conventional produce. I want to stop swimming upstream, because I'm just so tired. I'm tired of hurting, failing, and forgetting. I'm tired of emails, notifications, logs and plans. I'm sick of schedules. I won't do any of that, though. No matter how much I want to, I will just keep moving, because I don't want to die. And in the back of my mind, even in my most stagnant and slothful state, I could not enjoy it. I could feel the self-hatred brewing beneath the escapism. I cannot escape my self. I cannot escape my harshest judge, the one who knows that life is only about moving forward, even though that eventually leads to death, too.
So the only secret to not sucking at life is that even when you suck at it you can't stop. I wish I could say that it is easy. It's not. It is hard to care about being better, and know, without a doubt, that your work toward that goal will never end.
