Finding direction.

Alice: Would you tell me, please, which way I ought to go from here?
The Cat: That depends a good deal on where you want to get to.
Alice: I don't much care where.
The Cat: Then it doesn't much matter which way you go.

I so frequently find myself wanting to know which way I am supposed to be going and what the next step along my path is going to be. I get so caught up in trying to learn the right steps that I often lose track of where it is that I am trying to get. 

Direction. You spend your whole life striving to reach a goal, to become whatever is it that you dreamed of as a kid. No one tells you then that dreams may not work out. And to learn that lesson at 22 is not a particularly pleasant experience. After the fallout of dream number one, comes the need for a development of dream number two. How do you redefine the direction of your life? Because if you don't know where you are headed, how does any of the rest matter?

After months of anxiety and limbo between school and employment, I finally stumbled my way into my plan B. Three weeks from now I will be boarding a plane headed for Japan. Despite my nervousness and anxiety, I could not be more excited. I will be in Japan for 18-ish months followed by 6-12 months in Charleston and whatever else the Navy has in store for me. My life once again has a direction... I at least have the semblance of a plan.... at least for the next 5 years.

After that, who knows? I have learned more than anything else this past year that plans must be flexible and that your direction can change in an instant. January 23 becomes my day 1 in a five year journey to figure out what it is exactly I am to do with the rest of my life. I hope at the end of these five years I can answer the question of where it is I am headed...