Aries Moon
Growing up, I had a very active imagination. I would escape into a world of my own making when things got hard or scary.
When I was a teenager, my imagination became very boy focused. I would get crushes that would consume me and of course I would let myself become emotionally absorbed in them. I was aware they were not real, I wasn’t that delusional, but I thought if I wanted it bad enough, if I thought about it hard enough, I could manifest it into being.
But people are messy, and real life rarely follows the script in our heads.
My daydreams don’t have any effect on other people or how they interact with me. I can only live the life I want. I can’t make people chase those desires, no matter how vividly I imagine them. Most people don’t always want to take a chance or follow something that excites them because they are afraid how they may look or how other people may perceive them. There is always a reason to not do something or try something, especially if you are looking for one.
It may seem silly, but that was one of the hardest things about growing up for me. I get an idea in my head and go after it. I get so excited about things. If I get an urge to do something, I do it. I have said before that I want to experience every bit of life I can, follow every passion or desire I have. I think sometimes people get overwhelmed or think I make things mean too much, but in actuality, I just want to feel things intensely and I want to be moved. I want to take risks and do crazy things, I want stories to tell and stories to keep just for me. If something makes me feel good, I want to feel it with all that I have. I can control that. I can control my decisions and my activities and my life. But I can’t control how other people want to live theirs.
Life comes with disappointments, false hope and dreams that never come true. But it also comes with surprises. Things that you never even expected, things that you never could have thought were possibilities.
I don’t want to force an outcome for my life. It’s easy to get disillusioned as you get older, whether you have an active imagination or not. We stop believing that things can still happen. I used to grip things so tightly in my hand for so many years and never let them breathe, never let them grow by themselves. I was scared of what would happen if I did. But I’ve learned to loosen my grip. Enjoy the fantasy, but leave my hand open enough for life to land on its own.
Maybe growing up wasn’t learning how to stop dreaming.
Maybe it was learning how to hold fantasy gently without asking it to save me.