I’m about to make another achievement in the world tomorrow if my farcical graduation ceremony is anything to go by. I’ve successfully completed my training college studies and have progressed to the on-field portion of my probationary employment.
I am a little excited, but more so for my colleagues than myself... I’ve seen them develop alongside me and can share in their joy and sense of accomplishment. But I don’t particularly feel the customary jubilation for my own achievement.
So I started to wonder why... and here are my thoughts to date:
- I do have a real distaste for being given acknowledgment by a certain body (especially a self appointed one that I may not personally respect or hold in high regard). I can gauge my capabilities quite accurately in most circumstances (academic primarily) and I love gaining knowledge and expanding my understanding on different matters, but to then have to prove that to a governing agent(cy) and to have them present you with their ‘certification’ does rub me the wrong way. I dislike being expressed as a non-entity and given worth on their designed and quantified scale. Yes, I am aware of the many ironies of judgments and scalings we all use in our daily lives... I still find it irritating (rebelling against authority?).
- I need a major event to be of importance. I need to care for it myself, and to a very real degree I need the important people in my life to care for my acknowledgment. Does it really matter if a random person or entity congratulates me? I am tediously weary, and irrationally aggravated by ingenuity and social games that people play. I don’t want words or actions which don’t have a truthful meaning behind them.
- Moments of actual innate joy and appreciation are extremely personal. No one can truly appreciate the many small intricacies in your life and the trials and tribulations you may have undergone to reach a conclusion that invokes these feelings within you. At times like these, perhaps because of my lacking nature, I feel an intense desire to share my happiness with those that have affected my life in a positive way in achieving this fleeting euphoria. Can I give my memories life by sharing them with my loved ones? If I should forget, can I relive it in their eyes? In their re-telling of that moment? In that reminiscent joy that they express for me? Who should I burden with such a heavy responsibility?
So what does that leave me with? Buggered if I know.