Dear Jessica Brennan,
I have spent a lot of time trying to find the one-thing I am meant to be. That one passion that is mine to follow.
I often beat myself up for liking to do a lot of things. I like to write this blog and songs and books. I like to sew and plant gardens and I like to watch Masterclass and TedTalks; mostly I like to learn. I like to cook and work on a variety of projects all the time, because I get bored really easily. I detest boredom.
This multi-interest life sounds like something to celebrate as I write about it, but I can still hear my mother’s voice telling me with exasperation, to focus. Find the one-thing you’re good at, and do it well. Then to reinforce her message, the voice of the world told me the same thing. Find the one-thing Sharon. Stop getting distracted and focus. What are you going to be?
This has caused me a lot of self-doubt and pain. I have tortured myself, reading and implementing exercises that keep me zoned-in on one thing, until I am lashing out and pacing like a caged animal. It has at times, made me feel sad; like I just don’t have what it takes to recognize my one-thing.
Finally I have learned that while I observe with awe, people like your Dad who have that one brilliant, focussed thing they can do, I am an alien in a one-thing world. And just like only wealthy people say that money can’t buy happiness, it is one-thing-wired people who have convinced us of the mythology that you have to find your one-thing or you aren’t doing life right.
Well guess what world? I don’t hear life at that frequency. That kind of thinking and living feels like radio static in my central nervous system.
If I have one-thing, then my one-thing is curiosity. Hard to pin down on a resume, and all but impossible to monetize, but that’s it. Each day the desire to observe something new, and solve a new puzzle. Each moment a blank canvas to try something else, that works; or doesn’t. In my world, it is all just experience.
Dear Jessica, if you have been blessed with the one-thing gift, then do it well. But if you have not, then recognize the blessing of the kaleidoscope of life that can be yours to discover when you are not focused on just one special thing.
Love,
Mum xo
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