“To reside with out arriving is to learn 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 might level to and say, That is it. That is who I’m. I trusted that if I labored truthfully, adopted what mattered, and stayed true to my values, that second would come.
Now, a lot later, I’m going through the likelihood that it by no means will.
I do know I’m not alone on this, even when we don’t typically speak about it. Many people carry an unstated expectation that effort will ultimately resolve into one thing recognizable—one thing steady, legible, and rewarded. When that doesn’t occur, we have a tendency to show inward, assuming we missed one thing or misunderstood the foundations.
Staying, as I perceive it now, means remaining current with out that arrival. It means persevering with to reside inside a life that doesn’t resolve the way in which we anticipated. This essay is about what it looks like to remain there—and why naming that have issues.
There’s a worry I hardly ever admit, even to myself. It’s not precisely the worry of failure, or growing old, 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 might 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. But it surely typically existed outdoors the seen methods that confer legitimacy. After I tried to completely settle contained in the tradition I returned to, I spotted one thing painful: I didn’t know learn how to belong to it, and it didn’t fairly know what to do with me.
That realization got here slowly. Via job functions that went nowhere. Via well mannered rejections. Via 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 end up the way in which I anticipated. It’s the worry that this lack of arrival may replicate on my kids—that they could really feel they’ve to elucidate me, or quietly distance themselves, or ponder whether 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 could maintain.
Now I’m sufficiently old to query whether or not it ever did.
Growing old has a approach of sharpening these questions. Whenever you’re youthful, disappointment feels provisional. There’s nonetheless time to pivot, to reinvent, to reach later. Because the years cross, the story feels much less open-ended. You start to see not solely what you probably did but additionally what you didn’t turn out to be.
And nonetheless—I’m right here.
Nonetheless pondering. Nonetheless attempting to reside truthfully. 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 purported to inhabit. Somebody who mistook integrity for foreign money. 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 approach—however within the sluggish realization that the values I lived by don’t all the time convert into safety or standing.
That worry doesn’t come from dishonesty. It comes from dissonance—from the hole between what we’re advised issues and what’s truly rewarded. And from questioning how these we love will interpret that hole.
There’s a specific loneliness in feeling like an outsider in your individual 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 reside in alignment quite than ascent.
That approach of being has given me which means. It has additionally left me uncovered.
I wish to be clear about why I’m penning this.
I’m not providing an answer or a lesson. I’m naming an expertise many individuals carry quietly: dwelling with care and intention and nonetheless not arriving the place they thought they might. I’m writing as a result of naming it will possibly soften the isolation round it. Staying is simpler when it feels shared.
I might form this right into a story of quiet triumph. I might easy the sides and recommend that the whole lot labored out ultimately. 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 trustworthy.
I don’t truly know the way my kids see me. This worry might reside largely inside me. But it surely speaks to one thing bigger than my circle of relatives. It speaks to how deeply we equate price with visibility, success with legitimacy, and care with measurable outcomes.
I provided love. I provided consideration. I provided presence. I provided 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’s that our tradition gives 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 id, consequence, 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 apply.
Some days I handle it. Different days, the previous worry returns—that I didn’t turn out to be 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 trustworthy. A father or mother 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 folks I 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 could have been simpler to vanish into bitterness or efficiency.
To reside 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 dwelling with progressive imaginative and prescient loss from macular degeneration. His work explores presence, caregiving, resilience, and the quiet energy of small moments. He’s presently 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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