Was going through some old letters I wrote and came across one from 1982. I was then 33 years old. This is the part that's pertinent:
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Boy do you ever sound frustrated. I'm sure the smoking quittage and the planets aligning and being home without a specific thing to do every day (i.e. your job), and choosing things to do that are frustrating in themselves are all responsible for the crazies. It's so great that you guys have stopped smoking. I berate myself every time I light up and it's driving me mad. I find that I can analyze it to death with no results except more self loathing. I question deeply the need and can find none, except perhaps fear of stopping. Fear of not having the courage to stop. Changing patterns has got to be the hardest task ever for the security-seeking ego. I think it takes re-programming, probably why "smokenders" and the like are so beneficial. I know it takes discipline, something which I have been sorely lacking for too long now. I find that with a prospering career, things become easy, the drive to accomplish lessens.... I’m caught in an unmotivating, non-productive recess where even the joy of play is dampened by the eternal, unremitting cloud of knowingly wasted potential. Talk about frustration. I am riddled with thoughts of all the things I could do, should do, and don’t do. What happened to mind of my youth that could play and enjoy effortlessly doing nothing. When and why did guilt creep quietly in? And how does one transform guilt into an all-rightness? I guess one can only conquer the demon by overcoming its needs; fulfilling the deeds prescribed. But the organism balks equally at discipline and at the lack of discipline. And I find myself balancing on the edge of the coin. Can’t seem to find the catalyst, the motivational force to turn the coin over – in either direction. Hopefully I’ll get my act together on my own before that inner entity that teaches us throws up some devastation by which I’ll have no choice.
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Well, I got my act together March 1, 2006. Twenty-four years later. Don’t wait as long as I did. Okay?!
