Finding My Niche

From the moment we are old enough to decide what we want to be when we grow up we try to find ways to make our niche in this world. Most little girls line up their dolls on tiny chairs and have tea parties, hoping one day to be someones wife and mother. Little boys take their Tonka trucks into the backyard and dream about being a real life Bob the Builder. When we turn 8 or 9 a lot of little ones dream of being a doctor or a veterarian or a lawyer. As we get older those dreams change. Girls dream about being models, boys dream about being rock stars. Girls dress up in their mothers clothes and high heeled shoes and strut in front of full length mirrors. Boys run through the house with headphones on, jamming to air guitars. Dreams of wealth and fame consume our adolescent dreams.

As we get older we tend to be disappointed by reality because we spent so much of our lives expecting things that are simply unrealistic. If the world were filled with musicians and models who would create the cure for AIDS? If we are all lawyers and doctors who would we care for, who would we defend? If our lives turned out exactly the way we planned, what would we strive for? There would be no fantasies, no dreams, no passion for living.

I believe that we are all put on this earth just to "be". Just to learn and love and be a part of something bigger than we could ever have imagined while planning our imaginary tea parties or building skyscrapers out of dirt. We are put here to make mistakes that we learn from, to hurt and learn to recover, to lose love and learn to love again, to crash and burn and then learn to rebuild ourselves. It gives us hope and faith, something to live for. It gives us a reason to go to sleep at night and hope for peaceful dreams. It builds strength and the character that seperates us from being one big conglomerate of prayerless, unfearful, unloving, emotionless creatures.

I am learning to love and appreciate my emotions and the emotions of those around me. I am learning that its ok to cry and let others see you doing it. I know that its ok to be vulnerable and to ask for help. I know that I can be strong, yet feminine. Subtle, yet tough. Motherly, yet sexual. Being me, in the midst of all this chaos is a good thing and for now, I am content to just "be". I have found my niche.