on fulfillment

This year has felt very long, like I've lived several different lives throughout its course. I have made it through a long-distance relationship, an engagement, a 900-mile move to a big city, my first full time job, my best friend's wedding, photographing ten weddings, one sister's high school graduation, the deaths of people I love, a wide variety of mountain adventures, and conducting almost 15 of these interviews (though only half got published). And those are just the big moments.

Through all of that, I've tried to keep the idea of "fulfillment" at the forefront of my mind. What does it mean to be fulfilled? To really seek it, to feel it, to live it.

When I think of fulfillment, I flash back to summertime, to being sixteen years old, to nighttimes that unfurl in the impossibly infinite way that comes with youth. I picture driving in repeated circles around roundabouts and laughing with my friends until our ribs are sore, our hair windblown and wild. I remember knowing that these nights were something divine, composed of simple, sacred, utterly delightful moments. I was not stressed or laboring over my purpose in life. I was simply living it. 

That's not to say I don't think we should pursue fulfillment actively and intentionally. I believe the people, activities, and habits we allow in our lives impact us deeply. The things we invest in have the power to radically uplift us, adequately satisfy us, or slowly destroy us. It's so vital for us to think about how we're spending our day to day lives.

Those two ideas might sound contradictory, but I really think they go hand in hand. My job is to bridge the gap between them: to create a lifestyle in which there are more moments that I truly inhabit.

Realistically, this looks like being intentional with my time. I know that using a spare hour to write or paint is going to fill me up more than watching Netflix. Asking questions and actively listening to my loved ones will give me more rewarding relationships than if I'm distracted by my phone or only talking about myself. And so on. 

Life is mostly composed of what some would deem the "mundane moments." But I think those small, seemingly insignificant times can bring us the most fulfillment if we're living in the right mindset. The poet Mary Oliver said, "the soul exists and is built entirely out of attentiveness." The more I've lived with the idea of fulfillment at my core, the more I've found this to be true. I am in constant awe of the how the sky shifts every day and trees that change and babies smiling in the grocery store. You could say I'm wearing rose-colored glasses or that my naive idealism is showing, but I believe the beauty of life can constantly floor you if you let it. So I let it. 

No matter what 2015 brought you, I hope you can look back and find fulfillment scattered throughout. I hope this next year overflows with it and leaves you laughing at the abundance.