Every day, I go through my day as best as I can. I put everything I can into my work, into who I am, and into what I love. Yet, every day I stop myself, look at my life, and feel like a stranger going through the motions of someone else's existence.
I often wonder, "What am I doing with my life?" And often times, the answer that comes back is a pre-recorded one:
Trying to be happy, making the best of my time.
Yet such answer is vague (at best!). Other more concrete answers sound just as phony and unfulfilling:
To create art. To have some meaning.
Etc. etc. Yet most of those don't click at the time of asking. I can never really grasp a meaning of what I want at any particular time of asking. It's an elusive concept that somehow worked in the relative past but never works in the present.
But it's what drives me. Answering that question drives me. Every day is different and it drives me. I don't have a "list method" or a "this and that method", I don't have a GTD method to fulfilling my life. At least not for every day, for every thing, and for every part of my existence. Every bit is different and keeps changing.
Recently, I started reading God Emperor of Dune and something Lord Leto II said struck true with me. He talked about his breeding program (to make a perfect human) and he tried to explain this one thing to his servant Moneo. Moneo asked about mutations that happen across generations and how to deal with them since they clearly trespass any kind of prediction.
Lord Leto replies that with each generation, he throws out the rules he's made for his program and makes new ones. It boggled everyone's mind how he could keep a consistent program with a positive direction, one that is strict about its final destination, by changing the rules. Moneo, the Bene Gesserit, and every one else fails to grasp this concept which he repeats through almost every chapter: accepting change, and adjusting to it immediately and without reservation and for long-term.
So, every day, I ask myself, "What am I doing with my life?" And every day I set a new goal, or lose a goal, or ignore my goals altogether, and approach my life differently. I change the rules with each moment.