“To stay with out arriving is to discover ways to keep.” ~attributed to the Buddha
For many of my life, I assumed that arriving was the purpose. Like many individuals, I believed maturity would ultimately ship a transparent function, a measure of safety, and a way of belonging I may level to and say, That is it. That is who I’m. I trusted that if I labored actually, adopted what mattered, and stayed true to my values, that second would come.
Now, a lot later, I’m dealing with the likelihood that it by no means will.
I do know I’m not alone on this, even when we don’t usually speak about it. Many people carry an unstated expectation that effort will ultimately resolve into one thing recognizable—one thing secure, legible, and rewarded. When that doesn’t occur, we have a tendency to show inward, assuming we missed one thing or misunderstood the principles.
Staying, as I perceive it now, means remaining current with out that arrival. It means persevering with to stay inside a life that doesn’t resolve the way in which we anticipated. This essay is about what it seems like to remain there—and why naming that have issues.
There’s a worry I not often admit, even to myself. It’s not precisely the worry of failure, or growing older, or monetary uncertainty, although all of these are shut by. It’s the worry of being a humiliation. Not publicly. Not dramatically. Quietly. The type that by no means causes a scene however lingers within the background of household life, unstated however felt.
I typically fear that my kids see me as somebody who implied—maybe too casually—that issues would work out. That I might discover my place. That I might arrive. I imagined myself as a father who may level to one thing concrete and say, Right here. That is the place I landed.
As a substitute, I really feel like somebody who by no means fairly discovered a spot right here.
A lot of my grownup life unfolded elsewhere—geographically, culturally, creatively. I labored, taught, made issues, contributed. I had function. Nevertheless it usually existed exterior the seen programs that confer legitimacy. Once I tried to completely settle contained in the tradition I returned to, I noticed one thing painful: I didn’t know find out how to belong to it, and it didn’t fairly know what to do with me.
That realization got here slowly. By means of job purposes that went nowhere. By means of well mannered rejections. By means of the quiet discomfort of being requested, “So what do you do?” and realizing that the reply not match neatly right into a sentence.
What troubles me most isn’t that issues didn’t prove the way in which I anticipated. It’s the worry that this lack of arrival may mirror on my kids—that they could really feel they’ve to clarify me, or quietly distance themselves, or wonder if their father believed in one thing that wasn’t true.
That perception—that sincerity, care, and significant work would ultimately translate into safety and recognition—wasn’t one thing I invented. I inherited it. And I handed it on, trusting it might maintain.
Now I’m sufficiently old to query whether or not it ever did.
Getting old has a means of sharpening these questions. If you’re youthful, disappointment feels provisional. There’s nonetheless time to pivot, to reinvent, to reach later. Because the years go, the story feels much less open-ended. You start to see not solely what you probably did but in addition what you didn’t turn into.
And nonetheless—I’m right here.
Nonetheless pondering. Nonetheless attempting to stay actually. Nonetheless waking every day inside a life that didn’t ship the readability I anticipated, however did ship depth, accountability, and care. Many individuals attain this level quietly, with out language for it, questioning whether or not they’re alone within the reckoning.
I don’t see myself as a tragic determine. I see myself as somebody who didn’t match the story he thought he was imagined to inhabit. Somebody who mistook integrity for forex. Somebody who believed that significant work would naturally result in welcome.
Often, I wake at evening with a humbling thought: What if I misunderstood how the world works? Not in a dramatic means—however within the sluggish realization that the values I lived by don’t at all times convert into safety or standing.
That worry doesn’t come from dishonesty. It comes from dissonance—from the hole between what we’re informed issues and what’s truly rewarded. And from questioning how these we love will interpret that hole.
There’s a explicit loneliness in feeling like an outsider in your personal tradition. Not exile—only a regular sense that the dominant language by no means fairly landed in your mouth. The language of ambition, certainty, self-promotion. I’ve spent a lot of my life listening greater than declaring, attempting to stay in alignment quite than ascent.
That means of being has given me which means. It has additionally left me uncovered.
I need to be clear about why I’m scripting this.
I’m not providing an answer or a lesson. I’m naming an expertise many individuals carry quietly: residing with care and intention and nonetheless not arriving the place they thought they might. I’m writing as a result of naming it will probably soften the isolation round it. Staying is simpler when it feels shared.
I may form this right into a story of quiet triumph. I may easy the perimeters and recommend that every little thing labored out in the long run. However that may miss the reality I’m attempting to honor. This can be a round story as a result of many lives are round. Nothing right here is resolved. That’s not a failure—it’s merely sincere.
I don’t truly know the way my kids see me. This worry might stay principally inside me. Nevertheless it speaks to one thing bigger than my family. It speaks to how deeply we equate value with visibility, success with legitimacy, and care with measurable outcomes.
I supplied love. I supplied consideration. I supplied presence. I supplied values that don’t match neatly into résumés or retirement plans. Whether or not that can really feel enough, I can’t management.
What I see now could be that our tradition presents little or no language for individuals who age with out trophies. There is no such thing as a ceremony for quiet contribution. With out markers, we start to doubt ourselves.
Buddhist teachings remind us that clinging—to identification, final result, or story—is a supply of struggling. I perceive this intellectually. Emotionally, I nonetheless need my life to make sense in methods others can acknowledge. Letting go of that want isn’t a single second of readability. It’s a every day follow.
Some days I handle it. Different days, the outdated worry returns—that I didn’t turn into what I implied I might, that the ending I anticipated might by no means arrive.
What I’m studying to carry alongside that worry is that this:
A life doesn’t must resolve to be sincere. A dad or mum doesn’t must arrive to be current. That means doesn’t require ensures.
I didn’t arrive. I’ll by no means arrive. However I stayed.
I stayed with the individuals I really like. I stayed with values that mattered to me. I stayed with work that felt true, even when it didn’t reward me. I stayed with myself when it might have been simpler to vanish into bitterness or efficiency.
To stay with out arriving isn’t peaceable. It may be humbling. However it’s actual.
And if there’s a function to this essay, it’s merely this: staying counts—even when the ending is unsure, even when the story doesn’t resolve, even when nobody is handing out recognition for it.
Generally staying isn’t the trail to which means. Generally it’s the which means.
About Tony Collins
Edward “Tony” Collins, EdD, MFA, is a documentary filmmaker, author, educator, and incapacity advocate residing with progressive imaginative and prescient loss from macular degeneration. His work explores presence, caregiving, resilience, and the quiet energy of small moments. He’s at present finishing books on artistic scholarship and collaborative documentary filmmaking and shares private essays about which means, hope, and incapacity on Substack.
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