{"id":7624,"date":"2019-04-19T09:30:52","date_gmt":"2019-04-19T14:30:52","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/?p=7624"},"modified":"2019-04-24T09:18:43","modified_gmt":"2019-04-24T14:18:43","slug":"we-all-trade-for-something","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/www.christophergronlund.com\/blog\/tjw\/2019\/04\/19\/we-all-trade-for-something\/","title":{"rendered":"We All Trade for Something"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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A friend who has been very busy with some bigger things life has thrown their way in recent years is finally taking a deep breath and sitting down to write. They recently asked me a couple questions and gave me a compliment that made me smile:<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I want to be more like you when I grow up.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n\n\n\n

Me? Grown Up?<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I smiled because — while I consider myself an adult — I’m still not-so-sure about that grown-up thing.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the sense that I have been working since I was a teenager…that I’ve dealt with some serious issues earlier in my life than many have had to deal with even later in theirs (plus a few other things), I’m definitely an adult. But as some friends near the ends of 30-year mortgages, are on track for retirement in the next 10-20 years, or are watching their children growing up (some of those “kids” already passing me by on pace to becoming grown-ups), I still don’t feel like a grown-up.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(I feel grown up, but not like a grown-up, if that makes sense?)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This or That<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

I share all this because most of us trade for something along the way. In my professional work, I have turned down every request to move to management because I know, once I do, that work will no longer be a thing from which I can step away.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

What I’ve gained from that trade off is a pile of novels and some potentially good things coming from those efforts later this year. (Or maybe not, if history repeats itself…we will see.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

At times I’ve traded physical and mental health for close calls to much bigger things with my writing, but to be fair…many people I know trade those things for long hours struggling to keep up with their grown-up careers.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

It Doesn’t Have to Be Like This<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Of course, there are people who have balanced their careers (creative or not), and haven’t traded as much as some along the way. (And I think that’s wonderful!)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I have friends in creative and corporate jobs who call their own shots and have even more than they ever dreamed of. Not being jealous by nature (or even particularly envious), I am happy for these friends because they are proof that what so many aspire to can be a reality…even if the likelihood is that it may never be like that for most people.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

(Having the support of friends who have their shit together has, at times, made me feel the closest to being a grown-up as anything.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

The Reality<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

Somewhere along the way in my life, someone either told me that if someone offers a compliment and you deny it, you’re negating their intentions (or I came to the conclusion on my own). So…it made me happy to hear the friend I mentioned in the opening of this entry — someone I view as a proper grown-up — sees in me something they wish to be. (That alone is a reminder of the things that come one’s way in pursuing a creative endeavor, even if money may not.)<\/p>\n\n\n\n

I’ve traded a lot of things to get to where I am today, just as people I know traded to get to where they are in life. For me, I’m sometimes left thinking, “I will work until I die, and this thing I’ve chosen to do may never pay the bills…”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

For others, it’s, “I did what I was expected to do, achieved most of it, but I am left regretting that I didn’t do the things I<\/em> wanted to do along the way…”<\/p>\n\n\n\n

In the End<\/h3>\n\n\n\n

It’s not hard to find lists of things nurses who care for people at the end of their lives hear from people facing death<\/a>. It’s usually things like:<\/p>\n\n\n\n