To begin, I must say I am one who follows the instructions. Word for word. Step by step. If I do not have rules to follow, I am lost, and for me, it has become an annoying habit. I look for the instructions, the steps and the "equation" to solve things. In a sense, I guess it's a good thing. On the other hand, it's not such a good thing, because everything I do is rigid. I have to look for a pattern and follow the guidelines. I can't simply look at something and figure it out just from my own creativity. I have to map out a plan, get the rules, and figure it out from there. So yes, I must say it has gotten out of hand.
That is why I must say to those who have the same mentality, to get out of it. It may do you good for a while, until you can't only use what's given to you – you have to figure it out on your own. I've learned that when you have a strategy and a set of rules, you don't see the bigger picture; you only see the problem at hand and use only what is given to you in order to solve it. Unfortunately, life doesn't work this way. We aren't given a rule book in order to figure out heart break. No one gave Einstein a book to come up with the theory of relativity. He was simply curious enough to figure it out on his own. This curiosity is unfortunately the one most precious thing many of us have lost touch of. We expect to be told what to do and then we work based off of what we are given. We no longer work in order to create but to feed off of what we've already created. And this has unfortunately kept us in a constant whirl of applying the small instruction we know to everything we do.
However, this is not what has advanced our survival on this Earth. The first human beings on this planet were not given anything – no language to communicate, no recipes for food, no medicine to treat wounds, and no house to shield them from nature. They figured it out all on their own! They figured out sounds and shapes in order to speak to one another, they had a natural instinct to hunt because they were hungry, they figured out that things found in nature could essentially heal minor wounds, and they used whatever they could find in order to keep warm and have something over their heads and for their children as well. So what made them do all of this? What was the key to having nothing and creating the necessities for life? How has humanity advanced so far from the beginning of time? As I mentioned earlier, it has much to do with curiosity, but more importantly, they had a purpose to live and keep living and thriving. They didn't give up, because they didn't want to die or have their families die. If there was a need for something, somehow they'd find a way, and that's how we've come to be such an advanced species.
This is all to say that we can't let ourselves be the generation that stays in one place. We cannot be lazy and expect to be handed everything. We have to work just as hard, and maybe even harder, than our parents did. We need to be more aware of what is going on around us rather than letting people decide for us. We have to keep on creating; take the instructions and throw them out the window and make our own set, because we still have a long way to go and much to grow.
