If I won the lottery

If I won the lottery tomorrow I would:

Quit my job and study Mathematics at university
Buy a nice house close to the city
Get a personal trainer
Travel in the holidays

Chances are I’m not going to win the lottery, but my lottery list is attainable even without winning. Over the past year I have daydreamed about winning the lottery, possibly to escape the daily grind that I am not totally satisfied with. Don’t get me wrong, my job is rewarding and I do like going into work. I don’t like the long hours I do or the lack of social outings I get to attend. It seems my lottery list is really just a way for me to incorporate things into my life that I feel are missing.

Deep down, I’m yearning for adventure and learning, for fitness, for social connection. I’m not after things to fill my life, I’m after more experiences that better me as a human. Sure, the lottery will help with this. I can’t actually afford a personal trainer or to take lavish holidays. But I don’t need the lotto winnings to have the valuable experiences I’m after.

Without the aid of the lottery, I aim to have the most fulfilling life that I can. I have to start building better habits to get me there and taking great risks. You don’t grow in the comfort zone.

First things first, I really want to study mathematics. What motivates me is how little I understand it. As an adult, I finally appreciate how it explains the world around us, how we can predict things that haven’t happened yet! It will also help me in my current career so that’s a bonus too! After some research, I found an online Postgraduate Diploma of Mathematics that I have just submitted an application for. I’m thrilled! I’m doing this on my own, without winning the lottery.

I can’t keep thinking that there are obstacles in the way of me living the life I want too. There are hurdles, yes, but these can be overcome if you’re willing to put in the hard work.

My meaning

I really don’t want to write my assignment today, but I have to. I’m not going to bed until the Intro is finished and I’ve got some smart looking charts happening. It’s nearly 1pm and I have to go to my boyfriends house for dinner. His pa comes over every second Monday for a roast dinner, his pa is 91 and gets up every morning to go make stuff in his shed out of wood. What a champion.

I’ve been reading a lot lately about meaning, about how meaning is more important than happiness. I know that I have a tendency sometimes to want to chase happiness, I do things because I think they might make me happy, I read articles and blogs and stress when I’m not happy because I should be. I’ve learnt a lot though, I’ve learnt to go with the ebbs and flows of happiness and just accept them. Some days I feel awesome, other days suicidal. It’s all normal and everybody gets anxious and depressed from time to time, it’s when its ongoing that its an issue. Sometimes I worry about  becoming depressed again because I feel like it robbed me of so many years of my life. But I have enough tools in my mental wellbeing tool-kit now to recognise when I’m getting low and do  something about it.

Anyways, back to meaning. I think I’ve found my meaning in life, at least for now. What pushes me to do these shitty assignments, to make myself super uncomfortable in front of a class, to stay up late planning lessons; is to help people. I’m not going to rest until I feel I have helped someone along in there journey. It is my calling. This is what I do. I’m there for my students, or at least my future students. Maybe long after they’ve graduated, at least one of them will look back and think of me as a teacher who inspired to set goals and become a life-long learner. My passion and aim as a teacher isnt to get students to learn the curriculum well, a curriculum which they forget; but to instill in them an enthusiasm for learning, a passion for expanding your knowledge and a curiosity about the world around them. That’s what I want, that’s what will get me out of the bed in the morning.

I really need to devote a couple of hours to solid introduction reading time. Fuuuuuarrrrrrrrrrrk. I am excited about reading the literature but geez my perfectionism really hampers me sometimes. I don’t want to start because I want it to be a mystical unicorn of an assignment. Impossible standards. I just have to have 3500 words before midnight. That is my goal. I can refine tomorrow.