Never for money / Always for love

Why do we think we deserve everything? There was a time when people just lived. They went through the motions; they worked their jobs; they married somebody, whether they loved them or not. It was simple. It was life. It probably wasn't happiness, but the path was laid out for them. And the questions weren't so existential.

It's different today for us. We are a generation of wanting it all. We won't settle because, well, why should we? We went to college. We learned independence. We struggled and worked and tried and failed. We can start a new career every year if we want. We can stay unmarried and live free and without children. We can travel. We can run away. We can do exactly the opposite of what is expected.

We can do whatever we want, so why aren't we happy? Why must we always search for more and better? What is it that brings happiness in a world of possibility?

Money has always been important to me. My family didn't have it growing up, so I (and my brothers) have always placed value on it. It is stability and validation and security. Having a savings account is having a guarantee. I have, thus far, lived my adult life on a path toward stability... do I have enough savings to get me through this or that situation? Can I plan for retirement now like a responsible young adult? What's the smartest thing to do with my paycheck? This part of my brain is solid. I've never bought a thing on a credit card I couldn't pay back that month. I've never been in debt to anyone. I have always made my choices in such a way that I will not wonder: Can I get by?

But yet, there is another part of me, as big and pulsing and forceful as my practical side, that is seeping love and adventure and the desire for spontaneity. I want to find meaning and joy in everything I do. I want to live on boats and live out dreams. I want to wrestle in gardens and swim naked in seas. I want to laugh on every continent and sleep under every star. So I travel. And I dance. And I cultivate relationships that satisfy my need for the extraordinary. And at the same time, I put money in that bank account so I can afford the day-to-day that makes me feel secure. I put time in at a job that any adult should be proud to have. And I balance my work and my social life like a champ. But I don't quit my job to live in a cabin in the woods. Nor do I sell all my stuff and adventure across the country. I don't go WWOOFing in Australia or fishing in Alaska or train hopping in Europe.

My emotional core is pulling me one way, while my responsible nature is pushing me forward. I am a heap of contradictions and I want to figure out how to live both lives. How do we settle somewhere in the middle? How do we take the pieces of our lives and solve the puzzle so it fits just right. How do we wrestle the urge to stay young forever while also wrestling our innate desire to be grown up and take ownership.

I've been dating a guy who is kind of all of column B without much column A. He likes money, but he doesn't let it own him. He takes weird jobs and he takes chances and he doesn't settle. He truly believes he's going to die young because of disease in his family, so he wouldn't dare waste his time worrying about the future. I can't say I think it's smart, but I do find it admirable. He isn't consumed by the feelings of total dissatisfaction that plague me daily. He doesn't sit in front of a computer 30 percent of his life thinking about the million other things he'd rather do.

So why don't I do the things I desire? I desperately want the courage to take a chance. I want to live for love. I don't want to die with a healthy savings account that could have instead bought me a million memories. I don't want to waste my young years — or any of my years for that matter. God, grant me the courage to be fucking fearless.

Never for money; always for love. 
From my favorite song ever written. With lyrics of liquid gold.

I'm just an animal looking for a home /  Share the same space for a minute or two / And you love me till my heart stops /  Love me 'til I'm dead

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De(com)pressed

I've been avoiding writing about Burning Man this year because most of my post-burn thoughts are about the post-burn, not the burn itself. The week on playa I can sum up in a few sentences: I had an amazing time with my best friends, saw more art this year, treated my body better and got married to a very dear friend. I felt bonds with certain friends grow stronger. I realized I might be a bit of a nudist and I realized I definitely want to contribute more to any future burns. I spent eight and a half days challenging my body, challenging my brain and challenging my patience when our RV broke down for 7.5 hours just after our 8 hour exodus. I will remember this year fondly, though maybe not quite as fondly as my first. I will always be grateful for the opportunities I have finally found to join my loves on the playa.

I woke up on Saturday, having partied myself out, feeling very ready to leave. As my friends started discussing plans of their early departures, my heart began to feel heavy and the day quickly became night. I put on my favorite outfit I had saved for the last night (gold! gold! gold!), but after watching the man burn, many of us just needed to go to bed. I just couldn't do one more night, so I got a few hours of sleep and woke up in the early hours of the morning to join for one last temple sunrise. I was filled with sadness the second I got there—and it wasn't because of the impending goodbyes. I looked around me and saw groups of my friends in puddles, people I love coupling up, and I was consumed by the feeling that I had no one. In a sea of the most beautiful, wonderful, loving people I know, I felt utterly and completely alone. And I couldn't shake it for the next 24 hours.

Last year I took from the playa the magical realization that I had the most amazing non-family-family anyone could ask for. I felt full and accepted and was gushing with the feeling that I was a part of something big. Because this feeling was so good and so new to me, my re-entry was especially hard because I was dealing with the loss of this. I couldn't help wonder if it would last; would I continue to feel like an important cog in the wheel that is our tribe? Or was this just a fleeting feeling... a Burning Man high that would inevitably come down?

It didn't. The year between burns was amazing; our friends kept in touch across the country and across the world and I think none of us lost sight of the importance of how our friend group has grown and developed into an honest collection of deep friendships and love. So I can check that off my list. Friends: got 'em!

This year my heart was weighed down by a difficult feeling of loneliness. One I hadn't experienced, maybe ever. How was it possible that I can count dozens of people—on the playa and back in the real world—who I would consider true, friends-for-life and still I could feel so empty? I've done a pretty good job of being okay with being a single person in the wake of my friends settling down, but as I looked around and witnessed so many people experiencing that last sunrise in the arms of someone they loved, I felt defeated. And ashamed. I've spent my entire 20s alone. This magical decade when we get to travel and explore and make mistakes and make adventures. The time when no one questions your decisions and when you don't question yourself. I thought of all the things I had missed out on by being alone and of so many things I'll never get to experience with a partner.

I biked back to camp that morning and got a few more hours of sleep before we went into departure mode. Breaking down camp, packing up tents, preparing the RV. Temple burn was strange that night. A good chunk of our group had already left and for some reason, of those who were still there that I loved immensely, I didn't feel close to any of them in that moment. Last year I experienced the temple burn hand-in-hand, with explosions of love and emotion from my friends. This time, I watched the temple burn, surrounded in friends, but completely alone.

The rest was just motion. Back to camp, back to bed, back on the road. I wanted to believe the feelings would go away when the "hangover" wore off and the decompression was complete. But they haven't yet. I went to a wedding last weekend and was overcome with the same emotions. I had such a great time with a different group of friends who I love dearly and felt so much gratitude to have the chance to spend time with these people I'd grown distant from over time. But when I stepped back for a moment and looked around, I was overwhelmed by sadness. I took a walk, stared up at the dark, ranch sky, filled with so many stars my heart was bursting, and I sobbed. Not for Burning Man, but for me. I don't want to be alone anymore. I want someone to share my fears and sadness and joy with. I want someone to help me in my life's decisions. I want to feel that I am needed by someone. That I am the thing that keeps someone solid and grounded. I want to be grounded. I am so lucky to have so much love in my life, but it's not enough.

It's been really hard to come back this year with these feelings. Last year my loss felt great and it saddened me for a long time until I realized that I hadn't really lost anything. But this year, my sadness is about me. I'm no longer able to convince myself that the love of my friends is all I need. And I'm scared that this is a loneliness that will never end. There is no easy remedy.

Burning Man is hard. I went to a beautiful playa wedding this year where the officiant compared marriage to the event—because of its great difficulty and challenges but also because of its love and beauty. "It's tough. Marriage is tough. Burning Man is tough... The playa is not easy. It is work... You will cry and it will be hard, but it will be full of amazing and magical moments."

What an emotional place. I think we go through everything there: joy, excitement, hunger, thirst, hot, cold, fear, euphoria, sleeplessness, aimlessness, loneliness, happiness. I wonder if a single person makes it off the playa without shedding tears? The biggest challenge is to come home and not let the emotion consume you. I've got three more weddings to make it through in the next month. Three more star-gazing, tear-shedding unions and then I hope I can learn to love me alone again. Otherwise, I think I'll have lost this year. And that would be a tragedy... cause I'm told I won the mutombo gold last year.

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The best part about making a list

We all want to be somebody. There is this idea ingrained in us from movies and our idols and our parents that we can leave a legacy behind, no matter who we are. That we can be remembered. So maybe it starts out big, with the dream of being a famous actress. And then when you get a bit older and realize how big that childhood dream was, you start to think about a more subtle legacy, like writing a book or starting a non-profit or becoming a doctor and changing the world one person at a time. But later you get smarter and you realize that you really aren't smart enough for any of that, so again you reconsider. Now, your legacy might be that you raised an incredible family or that you traveled all over the world or that you filled your life with love.

It's sad to see dreams diminish as you age. As ideas prove to be more and more unattainable, our desires become less ambitious. I've given up on acting and going to space. I'm not going to write a legitimate book and I'm not going to grad school because there's no path I feel passionate about following. So now, even the little things are becoming harder: I'm struggling to be creative and I'm struggling to find value in my daily life. These days, my dreams feel weak and lazy. In fact, it feels like I'm giving up on having dreams at all. It's a lot easier to be satisfied with what you already took than to challenge yourself to take more. So, because like so many others, I'm afraid of change and failure and of what is difficult, now I'm just standing still.

Most days I feel happy and I tell myself that the direction my life is going feels right. But that one day each month, where I see through my own cover story and let out the critic, is enough to know I'm full of shit.

I don't want to stop trying and I don't want to stop growing, even if I don't know what I want to try. I have a good handful of friends who demand the ultimate fervor from themselves. These friends live each day like there are things to accomplish and that they won't be satisfied unless the dreams get checked off the list. I haven't even begun checking mine off. I've been erasing them. I want a list that gets bigger every day... with items that get crossed out, not that disappear. So, I guess I start by writing a list.

An exercise in stream of consciousness: "What would I do if I had all the time in the world?"
Write more. A lot more.
Take photos.
Play music.
Travel. Once a year, take a trip somewhere else in the world. Twice a year see a friend or family who lives somewhere else in the U.S.
Cook a new meal every week.
Cook meals for my friends.
Learn Spanish.
Learn French.
Take dance classes.
Take art classes.
Build things. Draw things. Make things.
Go on dates.
Don't be afraid to try to fall in love.
Call my grandparents.
Call my nephew.
Call my mom. She misses me.
Write letters to my friends.
Plant flowers and give plants.
Be more active. Run.
Read a book a month.
Watch less TV.
Go home more and see the friends who are important to me.
Try harder at work and be good at my job, even if I don't love it. It will lead me somewhere later on.
Stretch.
Try yoga.
Be happy being alone.
Ride my bike instead of driving my car.
Find places to swim.
Go to movies. Even if I have to go alone.
Tell the people I love that I love them in every way I can.
Find a real hobby so that when people ask you what you love you have an actual answer.

I've been pretty convinced — and convincing — that I'm really happy with my life right now. That having fun is my number one objective and it's true, I have been happy. But it can't last forever. And the days I question this are the days I should choose from this list. Because when I look at this in 5 years, I want to see that I struck these items out and continued to add more, not erase them because I'm sick of looking at them.

We have all made choices in life that led us to where we are. I can choose to be satisfied with mediocrity or I can do what I have done my entire life: work hard to prove to myself that I'm worth a damn.

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You don't always get what you give

"Selfishness is not necessarily a bad thing. None of us can really help the way our brain processes the world and selfishness just means that you are at the center of your own."

A friend of mine said this to me when we were discussing why it's hard to get what you need from someone who is too selfish to make time for others, lest they miss something better. I do think he's right that we're wired a certain way, that we are nurtured to become the person our parents accidentally, or intentionally, turn us into. I don't really think it's someone's fault that they have been trained to care most about themselves. But I also believe that if you can't break free of that, if you can't give parts of yourself to others, then you are living a meaningless life.

It's hard to realize things about your friends that you just can't shake. You spend a lot of yourself investing in people that you care deeply for and after time, you're sometimes hanging on to something that isn't there anymore.

I recently had coffee with an old college acquaintance to talk shop about photography and I was pretty much in awe at what he has done with his life since school. He knew what he wanted to do professionally and personally and he did it. He told me that he has been spending the last few years getting rid of things in his life that he doesn't need and only holding on to the things that he truly wants and that fit into his future path. After we parted ways, I thought a lot about my own life and the pieces of it that I was holding on to for fear of letting go. From boxes of shit that I "might need again someday" to friendships that cause me more anxiety and sadness than they do joy.

I want to clean up my life. I want to get rid of the noise to make room for the things I need. I want to read more and play music and have good conversations. I want to write letters and get up earlier and feel satisfied. It's easy to say all the things I want to enrich my life with, but it is so difficult to actually make room for them.

I can throw out boxes of useless stuff and give away clothes I don't wear. I could probably even change my sleep schedule if I felt it was important for my happiness. But I just don't think I can let go those friendships. I want to believe that no matter the path we head down, the people we've chosen are there for a reason. On the other hand, if I am unwilling to say goodbye, I also have to be willing to accept that not every person in my life can—or wants to—give me all the things I expect. We have all grown up to be different people. We see the world in different ways and we each give what we can give. I give a lot to my friends: as kind words or long talks or fun nights out or tubes of lipstick. What I give most easily is my heart and my ear and my advice because I grew up to be a communicator and I have always believed our relationships are better when they're honest.

Not everyone can give that. And I won't be happy unless I accept this or say goodbye to those who cannot. But I've never liked saying goodbye. So I think my new challenge is working on accepting that my relationships may not always be what I expect, but that doesn't make them less important. When I move out of my house in a month I'll be tossing away the trash I don't need. That'll have to do for clean up. I won't be cleaning up my friends... just my expectations.

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Love is a luxury

It's been a long time since I've been in love. So long that I can't even remember what it feels like to love someone. I used to believe that love was all there is. I believed that our lives would only be truly fulfilled when we found someone to share them with. I believed that my life would be incomplete and sad and empty if I was alone.

But I've been alone for many years and what I've learned is that in the absence of the thing you really desire, you have to find other things to make you happy. Your friends and your nights out and your family and yourself. I have done a pretty good job of creating a life I am proud of. I've got great friends and a good job and the complete ability to take care of myself. I am the most independent girl I know and I am proud of that.

So while I'm sitting and waiting for the love of my life to come along—and learning to cope with the possibility that it could still be a very long time—I struggle with one horrible truth that cannot be altered by positive thinking and substitution therapy.

Sex sucks when you're single.

I know this can't be true for everyone but I believe I'm a good test case for the bulk of single female women; I've been practicing. We all know a girlgasm is hard to come by anyway, but without emotion attached, for me it's nearly impossible. Take me home passionate stranger and we'll probably do something crazy and have a great time. But we won't make it past the excitement of the unknown. Take me home boy I've been dating and with whom I already know this is going nowhere. We'll probably be glad we did, but you're not going to make me feel the way I want to feel. Take me home good friend of mine. We'll wake up laughing and then hang out all day as friends do and it'll be so fun and funny, but the satisfaction will be fleeting.

We are collecting names without collecting memories. We are writing lists of meaningless lovers without feeling love. And as the list gets longer and as time goes by, we start to forget what sex is for.  My generation is one that no longer attaches meaning to sex. It is just a thing we do; it is not a thing we feel. We go to porn festivals and we sleep with our friends and we brag about our conquests, but so many of us continue to wake up alone, even when we're next to someone. This is the kind of lonely that you actually feel. It's a physical loneliness that cannot be disguised by hobbies or work or friendship. This loneliness is taking over my body because when it means nothing, sex also feels like nothing.

I started writing this post on the plane on my way to New York. I intended to end it with a promise that I would be more intentional with my sexuality. A promise that I wouldn't waste my time having sex just to have sex. That if I could get back to the feeling behind it, I could get back to the point. But then I went to Manhattan and had my first honest-to-god, never-speak-to/see-you-again one-night-stand and it was fun and exciting and I had no regrets. I'm 28. I'm free from obligation and I'm free from moral guilt. I'm a human and I do not believe that we should limit our sexuality to the confines of being in a relationship. It's hard to tell myself to not be the person that I am and always have been. I'm open and curious and free. I know this part of me won't ever change so why would I ask myself to change it? But sadly I also know that as long as I'm giving in to the carnal desire of man, I'll keep yearning for the experiences that mean more and feel better.

A lot of friends of mine in relationships tell me they are jealous that I've been able to explore sexually and have an adult sex life. They think it's a luxury to be free to do what I want and experience the world as it is and as it evolves. I think they're wrong. Love is the luxury. Anyone can find someone to take them home. Love is what makes them come.

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Go down with the ship

I have a lot of flaws but one thing I am not is a flake. If there is a chance I don't think I'll follow through on something, I won't promise it. I believe in keeping your word and most importantly, I believe in loyalty.

A loyalist. That's what the enneagram told me I am. It's a hippy dippy personality model that my dear hippy dippy friend Taran showed me early in college. I probably scoffed at it back then, but I've recently looked again and the number I was assigned from the test I took, Number 6 - The Loyalist, describes me to a T:

Type Six in Brief:   

The committed, security-oriented type. Sixes are reliable, hard-working, responsible, and trustworthy. Excellent "troubleshooters," they foresee problems and foster cooperation, but can also become defensive, evasive, and anxious—running on stress while complaining about it. They can be cautious and indecisive, but also reactive, defiant and rebellious. They typically have problems with self-doubt and suspicion.  

At their Best: internally stable and self-reliant, courageously championing themselves and others.

• Basic Fear: Of being without support and guidance 

• Basic Desire: To have security and support

• Key Motivations: Want to have security, to feel supported by others, to have certitude and reassurance, to test the attitudes of others toward them, to fight against anxiety and insecurity.

As I read back on this, I am amazed at how easily I fit into this personality mold. And frankly, I'm proud of it. Of course these all come with their flaws, mine being insecurity, contradictions and the inability to make choices (libra much? That's what they tell me).

They are both strong and weak, fearful and courageous, trusting and distrusting, defenders and provokers, sweet and sour, aggressive and passive, bullies and weaklings, on the defensive and on the offensive, thinkers and doers, group people and soloists, believers and doubters, cooperative and obstructionistic, tender and mean, generous and petty—and on and on. It is the contradictory picture that is the characteristic “fingerprint” of Sixes, the fact that they are a bundle of opposites.

It's interesting to see myself as a stereotypical anything but I guess I hold no surprises. Back to the point of this post: Because I value it most in my relationships, I take pride in being a trustworthy friend. I strive to be honorable, reliable and worthy of my friends' trust and so far in my life, I believe I am actively living this goal. I am The Loyalist. And those who know me well know this. I see this quality lacking in a lot of people who surround me and despite my wish for this to be different, I realize that we just don't all value the same traits. Just like we don't all speak in the same "languages of love" or express our needs in the same way or place importance on the same actions and behaviors. But this loyalty is something I need from my friends and so loyal is something I am proud to be.

Typically, I'm not one for tests that try to tell you who you are, but I find the enneagram to be incredibly interesting because not only does it describe how you tend to behave and feel, it also goes into how you would behave or feel if you were completely healthy and secure with yourself — or if you were totally dysfunctional and unhealthy. All of my friends who have taken the test seem to line up exactly where it tells them and the descriptions pretty much sum them all up perfectly.

So, to the 6-8 readers of my blog, you should take the test. I'd be curious to see where you land and if you too think it's pretty dead on.

For me, identifying with a personality type has helped me recognize that some parts of my personality (good and bad) that I have always been aware of and sometimes questioned are pretty typical for people like me; it has also given me some pride. If this is how the masters of the enneagram see me, then I'm pretty happy with my reflection:

Sixes are the most loyal to their friends and to their beliefs. They will “go down with the ship” and hang on to relationships of all kinds far longer than most other types. Sixes are also loyal to ideas, systems, and beliefs... In any case, they will typically fight for their beliefs more fiercely than they will fight for themselves, and they will defend their community or family more tenaciously than they will defend themselves. 

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It's lonely out in space

I've been back from Burning Man for a little over a week and I've been thinking and searching for ways to express what the experience meant to me but in the end, all I can do is lament about its disappearance. It's coming in many forms, sometimes sad messages between me and my lost loves, other times laughter at the memories and photos. Tonight's rendition was a teary eyed dinner prep for one, accompanied by a Bon Iver soundtrack.

My week in the desert was the best week of my life. It's the only thing I can really say when people ask me how I liked it. It's hard to explain; sure, the constant partying and never ending dance parties are hard to beat anywhere else in the world; the endless laughs and endless free drinks are hard to come by in real life; the fun dressing up, the spirit of exploration, the willingness to accept and try what you don't know, the sexy air that floats above the playa and simultaneously the complete satisfaction of not needing sex or intimacy are remembered with complete longing. But the despair I feel is from losing the best part of the playa: my people.

Some of them were old friends and some completely new, but each night (and day) I couldn't get myself to go to bed because the thought of leaving their sides for mere hours was unthinkable. We did together what can be done no where else in the world. And you'd be hard pressed to find anyone who can do it better than us.

It had nothing to do with the drugs or the dancing, it had to do with the love. I could dance next to a stranger at the same amazing show at Robot Heart and I wouldn't move like that. I could electrocute myself holding conductors with someone else, but it wouldn't feel like that.

With anybody else I could paint my face neon and put lipstick on boys and wear crop tops and sequins and animal prints and explore pirate ships and explore DJs and climb structures and lie beneath streamers of wind and rain and watch lightening storms and watch buildings burn and have 90s music sing-a-longs and give hugs and kisses and drink one hundo mutombo bottles of champagne and whiskey and wear necklaces/drink from flasks of painted gold and nap during lunch on the dusty pillows and take five million delicious photos and stop in my tracks to tear it up at a mobile dance party and slowly each morning, as the light pokes out from the horizon, I could make my way by foot or by bike or by art car, to find BowRain standing true, a beacon for us all, to come together and pop bottle after bottle of bubbly, as the night turns to day and the hats and coats are shed, as the sunglasses are donned and the beats melt away; I could do this with anyone.

But I only want to do it with you.

And now that I am home and I examine my life, despite my good job and my loving circle of friends, I  don't really feel whole. Coming home alone is a lonely place. I imagine the transition is a bit easier if you are in a relationship because right now I feel like there is a part of me that I discovered in Black Rock City that no one in my "real world" knows. I guess that's what we Burners do; once a year we let ourselves out and then for 51 weeks we play make believe. Perceptions of Burning Man are kind of backward — people tend to think of it as a fantasy when really, after coming back, it's this world that feels fake. I guess that's why we greet each other "Welcome Home" when we set foot again on the playa.

I know these feelings of loss will fade and soon I will be back to my slave-to-the-man, technology-obsessed, priorities-off self, but I hope I can hang on to this feeling a little longer. The loneliness is tough but it makes me yearn for more; it makes me believe that there is more to life than what I've got, which is what I was hoping to discover when I left. I don't yet know what it is I want to change or seek but what I do know is that in the long search for love I've been on, true friendship is a pretty fucking great alternative.

Romance is hard. Sex and jealousy and obligation make dating stressful and painful. I've always been a people person and thus, the value I place on my life is measured by my relationships. Right now, friendships are the notches on my belt. My Portland friends are incredible and I don't mean to discredit my love for them or what they mean to me. Any of them could join me at the burn and I would feel for them just what I feel for these others. The difference now is that my Mutombos have seen me at my very best — and I'm pretty sure they all loved me. I loved me on the playa. And for 353 days, I will count down with the rest of ya'll the days until I'm that person again.

So I leave you with a lyric, from the dopest of bands (which I will defend to the death to all you naysayers), who made their appearance on the playa in the form of our very own 90s mashup sing-a-long- "doo doo doo, doo da doo doo." This is how I feel today and yesterday and probably forever more after every burn.

        I've never been so alone and I've never been so alive. 

                    - Third Eye Blind

Cheers to my Mutombos! I'll see you at home.
Iggy

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