I’ve noticed through the years how few opportunities are convenient. They don’t come at the perfect time, or with a path you can follow blithely. Most of the time opportunities ask as much from you as they give.
One could almost render this equation as a formula: Opportunity equals pain in the neck, or: O=PIN. Yes, of course you have to keep yourself open to opportunities. Not a free lunch though.
I suppose it is a good time to blame the balance of life. That colossal slacker Lao Tzu warns us redundantly about avoiding high aspirations: “Those who stride cannot maintain the pace.” “Keep stretching the bow, you repent the pull.” “Do enough without vying, Be living, not dying.” Yadda, yadda.
And yet, the regrets I do have are the opportunities I have not pursued.
I yearn for a calm, peaceful, easy life, but I’ve also hounded myself by a pursuit of Excellence. A thing unattainable because it is a target constantly moving two steps ahead of oneself. A perpetual frustration machine. A perpetual fascination.
