Answers After the Jump

You won’t know unless you try.
Often you don’t know until it’s too late.
The truth can hurt.
Regret is always a bitch.

All these statements are 100 percent accurate and equally frustrating. I’ve been waiting for some inspiration to use this entry title, and the stimulating conversation went down last night on my celly.

The concept of “after the jump” entered my realm of experience only weeks ago while reading a blog that I frequent. The idea is that, after reading bits of information on one page, you have to click on a link to another webpage before you receive the payoff (so to speak)!

(It's origin has something to do with newspaper lingo, but click on the title above to expand your knowledge further after the jump!) ;)

This concept can be compared to many life choices that we make blindly in hopes of the next “page” being worth the click/effort. We make insignificant choices everyday (i.e. what to wear to work, what to eat for lunch, etc.), but every so often we make life-choices that change us considerably. Unfortunately, many of these choices require a great deal of faith in ourselves, as well as faith in all the other parties involved (if it is a group venture). Faith is often times like shifting sand, and where there is fickle faith there will be doubt.

Doubt is a frequent companion of everyone going through (what some experts refer to as) the Quarterlife Crisis. But when doubt turns into an overwhelming and uncontrollable mindset, the results can be quite painful and sometimes catastrophic.

Many times the most intense life-choices that people make are motivated at some level by a four-letter word called Love and prompted by our fickle-friend named Heart. In the words of author J.T. LeRoy, the heart is deceitful above all things; and in the words of singer/songwriter Musiq Soulchild, so many people use the name of Love in vain. Both entities get us in trouble with ourselves more often than most of us would care to admit.

One of the concerns I have about serious love relationships (that I have witnessed lately) is that many people seem to lose a huge part of themselves during (or after) the commitment process. Me becomes us, and mine becomes ours. It reeks of compromise and I’m trying to come to terms with all of the implications, but I digress.

Back to the subject at hand, should you ever risk all you have in hopes of getting to mow the greener grass on the other side? My answer would be, “Only if you know that you’ll be able to afford to have someone mow it for you and want to look at the lawn for many years to come!”

Life is hard, and in a world of uncertainty and constant evolution security often seems appetizing. But when gaining that security requires you to give up too much of who you are, I would heavily question whether or not the sacrifice is worth it.

Worth is subjective, and it’s hard to convince someone of something’s true/lesser value when their appraisal of that something (or someone) is jaded by Love & when they tend to follow their heart without continually consulting their mind.

Many people jump without first looking closely enough at the ground below or the building across the way. Cheers to living with enough calculated risks to keep your time on Earth interesting and to dying with as few regrets as possible. Both of those things will lessen the need to come back in another life and do it all over again!