I have just completed a study of George Washington’s life and I am now in the midst of a study of Theodore Roosevelt. I find Roosevelt’s story encouraging. It is helpful for me to read of men with intense energy reserves and multifaceted interests who are able to accomplish on multiple fronts.
It seems that many of the circumstances around me, and in some sense even the people around me, conspire to limit me. It is not intentional; it’s just that they intimate that the pace I am keeping will necessarily slow down. They don’t mean a gradual slow down with age as much as they mean a breakdown. They well could be right, but I am not violently charging ahead.
I am carefully managing the circadian rhythms of my own body. I am carefully monitoring my reserves and my physical health. I am aware that consistency over the next fifty years demands balance in the current year. My net productivity will go down if I cannot sustain the optimum pace.
It appears that I just don’t seem to “fit in” well with many others. Often I have their friendship and their kindness. But it feels as though I have spent much of my life concealing the true extent of my activities and my thoughts – not because I do not want people to find out, but rather because it is all so different.
I feel as though my activities and thoughts will intimidate someone or raise questions about my credibility. At forty years of age I am a bit weary of suppressing my energies and interests. I suspect my pace is not going to slow down but rather speed up. I recognize that age has certain implications, but many of these I am making gains against because of the advantages of technology.
If there is anything I must be careful of, it is the balance of experiencing the present and simply surging forward for the sake of the future. I do think there is a way to be present in the glorious strain to the future objective. And much of what I consider “surging forward” is contemplative. I am not advocating busyness. I detest frantic activity. I am talking about purposeful living
