I Haven't Peaked Yet, Have You?

My girlfriends say some funny shit. I have more than one friend with a quotebook of things said while we hangout. And I’ve got one in my phone too, titled: “Actual Dialogue” – the most recent entry was, “that’s both a dis and a brag, on myself.”

But before the dis/brag entry is something a friend claimed that wasn’t meant to be funny, but was. Nor was it meant to be enlightening, but it was that too.

The question posed to our group was: what year do you think you peaked?

Her answer was: I haven’t yet.

To which I might add: ever.

But it got me thinking about the goal that's given to us by society: to peak. But the real beauty is in not doing so. Because what's after your highest point? Precisely.

I find it interesting how caught up we are with doing the most we can do by middle age. It’s like, if life isn’t in a big ole bow that can point to our vast achievements, we’re doomed. If we’re not every bit of who we want to be, we’ll never get there. Forever behind, forever lost, forever average…unless we’ve “arrived” at the peak by a certain year?

But there’s an infinite amount that we’ve yet to do. We haven’t made our greatest work yet. We haven’t learned the lessons that evolve us yet. We haven’t loved that person. We haven’t lost that opportunity. We haven’t gone through the hell that will give us the inspiration. We haven’t found out what we need to know. We haven't seen all that’s unbelievable. We haven’t changed the one belief that changes everything. We haven’t been our own miracle.

We haven’t peaked.

And I’m not sure I want to, right now anyways. I take a lot of inspiration from all that I can still become. It relaxes me. It lets me revel in it all. It lets me live a little.

So, if you’re putting a ton of pressure on yourself, maybe stop. And think about everything you haven’t done yet not as a sign you’ll never get there, but as an indicator of just how much there’s left for you to be. How much beautiful, open road you get to see and experience. How much more you that you get to become.

Peaking is overrated. Woman on xx