I know you guys probably don’t find him as interesting as I do, but I’ve said it before (probably far too many times), and I’ll say it again: I love Wil Wheaton…
It’s probably not that his blog or life is anything spectacular or out of the ordinary, but rather the transition he’s been through. Everyone saw him as the dorky Ensign Wesley Crusher on Star Trek: The Next Generation for years, and most of them probably hated him for it. Then, years later, he comes back to show you just how much more dorky he can be by blogging about life, love and fulfillment beyond the Starship Enterprise.
Two books (soon to be three!) later, and he’s helping me get back some perspective on life with posts like this:
Isn’t that weird? It is so easy to take your friends for granted, all the while thinking about them, caring about them, and enjoying their company . . . but not considering what they actually mean to you, until you don’t see them for an extended period of time for one reason or another.
On the way back to the freeway, we passed this lumber yard on Ball Road that always has interesting sayings on its sign. Yesterday, the sign said, “No man is a failure who has friends.”
The truth is, for a couple of months, I’ve felt like a huge, colossal, stinking failure in a lot of things that I’m not willing to go into right now. But spending a weekend with my friends, and a surprise Monday with my wife reminded me of some advice I’d been given and forgotten: Don’t let your work become your life, because when work isn’t happening, then what do you have?
Work may be frustrating, but life? Life is good.
Those comments have really hit home for me. I haven’t seen some of my best friends more than a half dozen times in the last year, and lately I’ve been wondering if this is one of those transition periods… You know, where everyone slowly loses touch because life has pushed them in different directions. As much as I don’t want to lose them as “friends”, maybe it’s time just to let go and face the fact that we can’t hang out like we used to and no matter how hard we try, it’ll never be like it was back in high school.
I also went through a bit of a life-crisis involving work recently. I felt unappreciated and insignificant, like I was resisted at every turn whenever I tried to improve the overall quality of life there, and was just generally down-in-the-dumps overall because of it. With no one to turn to for consolation, I mulled over it and slowly worked myself into a deeper and darker hole as the weeks passed. Then, it was like something inside me just snapped… Suddenly, I decided “fuck it, it’s not worth it anyway” and stopped caring so much. If they don’t want to take my suggestions and improve operations, that’s their problem. I’m not going to work 10 hour days anymore, and I’m not going to work at home anymore. If all they want is the bare minimum of effort, that’s what they’re going to get, and I’m not going to worry about it anymore.
So Wil, if you happen to stumble upon this in PubSub or through a trackback, I just want to let you know how much some of your posts can mean to your readers. I may not have kept up for the past month or so as your blog got lost in the mix that is my life, but now that I’ve come out the other side of that tunnel, you’ve really helped me grab back onto my perspective. Thank you!
Putting it all in Perspective, because Life is Good
I know you guys probably don’t find him as interesting as I do, but I’ve said it before (probably far too many times), and I’ll say it again: I love Wil Wheaton…
It’s probably not that his blog or life is anything spectacular or out of the ordinary, but rather the transition he’s been through. Everyone saw him as the dorky Ensign Wesley Crusher on Star Trek: The Next Generation for years, and most of them probably hated him for it. Then, years later, he comes back to show you just how much more dorky he can be by blogging about life, love and fulfillment beyond the Starship Enterprise.
Two books (soon to be three!) later, and he’s helping me get back some perspective on life with posts like this:
Those comments have really hit home for me. I haven’t seen some of my best friends more than a half dozen times in the last year, and lately I’ve been wondering if this is one of those transition periods… You know, where everyone slowly loses touch because life has pushed them in different directions. As much as I don’t want to lose them as “friends”, maybe it’s time just to let go and face the fact that we can’t hang out like we used to and no matter how hard we try, it’ll never be like it was back in high school.
I also went through a bit of a life-crisis involving work recently. I felt unappreciated and insignificant, like I was resisted at every turn whenever I tried to improve the overall quality of life there, and was just generally down-in-the-dumps overall because of it. With no one to turn to for consolation, I mulled over it and slowly worked myself into a deeper and darker hole as the weeks passed. Then, it was like something inside me just snapped… Suddenly, I decided “fuck it, it’s not worth it anyway” and stopped caring so much. If they don’t want to take my suggestions and improve operations, that’s their problem. I’m not going to work 10 hour days anymore, and I’m not going to work at home anymore. If all they want is the bare minimum of effort, that’s what they’re going to get, and I’m not going to worry about it anymore.
So Wil, if you happen to stumble upon this in PubSub or through a trackback, I just want to let you know how much some of your posts can mean to your readers. I may not have kept up for the past month or so as your blog got lost in the mix that is my life, but now that I’ve come out the other side of that tunnel, you’ve really helped me grab back onto my perspective. Thank you!