where is the fire?

I watched this inspiring clip where a professor asked, "What would you do if money weren't an object?"  And he walks his students through the steps of realizing what they want out of life.  Money is the object for most, or so most think - and so we work to make more money at jobs we don't like and we teach our children to follow this same vicious cycle - never realizing what we really want, or how going after what we really want would be more productive, rewarding, etc.

I started thinking about this again - what do I want if money were no object.  I thought it was a great question, but then I realized money is not the only object.  People, politics, and our personal inhibitions are pretty big objects as well.

The person who posted this video was someone I know who is currently traveling the world - and he posted it in response to why he is traveling- with the caveat that he still doesn't know what he wants.

When I was traveling, I think I did realize this - what I wanted, and that was to write no matter what.  To create.  I had been many places, seen many things, met many people - and I enjoyed it all.  But it wasn't what I wanted.  When I got home, after some years, I began planning a Mississippi River trip.  I had dreamed up this idea when I was younger - to canoe the river top to bottom - and after Hurricane Katrina, I thought I could combine my dream with a good cause.  And while I planned, and wrote, and asked for support... I realized my trip was going to cost a lot of money.  Money I could spend, but it seemed so ridiculously hipocritical to spend money on fancy light weight canoes and other such equipment when the need in New Orleans was so much more basic.  If I lost my home or savings in a flood, and some do-gooders come paddling down the river in the name of a fund raiser - taking the attention of media while my children are suffering from mold allergies - well, it's a bit ridiculous.  I could hand a check, but money wasn't the only object there was it.

Another time, when I was searching for my career, and I was delving deep into psychology, sociology, and education issues.  I was writing a story based on the school shootings and the details became to real - I could picture the disconnect in the students, the events of the day, the emotions - too clearly, and so I stopped. Because that's not what I wanted either.  I wanted my writing to edify - there was too much ugliness in this world.

When I first began my teaching career, or even before, I began dreaming of an alternative type school - one that taught hard work, responsibility, and discipline through nature, farming, and animals.  Something that what be individualized and would give students joy and pride in their work.  But I've realized, especially after working at a famous charter school - that I didn't really care that much about education either.

There are so many things I enjoy, but is there something out there I'm really passionate about?  In America we worked hard, and played hard - filling our free time with ... distractions.  In Turkey, there are surely less distractions to fill my time with, and I find myself content mostly.  Sometimes I wonder if I'm just sitting on my heels too much and not letting myself take risks for something meaningful.  Where is that fire that should burn in my soul?

I am working for my kids - I am raising them and happy with my family - but twenty or thirty years later, is my goal to simply raise them, educate them, support them towards good careers so they can have families and begin this same cycle?

Surely there is more.