I am not sure if I should be concerned about my irregular sleeping patterns as of late or if I should continue to do what I do best, learn. I know that I have had apprehensions in the past about not receiving the correct amount of sleep, but something has changed.
After learning so much at the ILI, and then coupling that experience with the Institute for Professional Development, I feel that it is time to expand my horizons once more. There is so much that I want to do in life, but in the past I purposely limited myself out of fear of doing too much. I thought that if I tried to learn too much, I would overwhelm myself, which is simply not true at all.
For years, I have been jealous of my peers who seemed, and still seem, vastly more educated than me. Yes, I do have significant life experience, but I want to learn about any and everything. And it has always been frustrating to see that my peers know so much when I know so little, at least from an intellectual standpoint. But instead of doing more to close this gap, I continued to complain. I did take time to learn, but if the information was outside of the school curriculum, it was unimportant to me. I always believed that so much of what was being published was irrelevant to my life. How could I not the circumstances of my life did not correlate at all?
I am ashamed to admit this, but my negative attitude toward education stemmed from the simple fact that I could not understand the information that was being presented to me. I would complete all of the assigned readings, do my homework, write the papers, ask millions of questions, and make excellent grades, but it was all to no avail because I was unable to see the big picture, which limited my ability to make any significant connections with whatever text I was investigating. I would search endlessly for relevancy, sometimes literally working myself to death trying to find an answer.
During my sophomore year, I remember pulling multiple all nighters, despite the fact that I would have football practice, class, and meetings the next day. There was one research paper in particular that frustrated me beyond belief. I was close to completing seven pages when suddenly my computer started to malfunction. And did I save my progress? Nope.
I was miserable. It had seemed that all of my hard work had amounted to nothing. I wanted to cry right then and there. I literally had to stop myself from destroying the study area of Milliken. Luckily, I had a friend there, an older classmate, that helped me to regain my focus. But then it was decision time: do I stay up till the sun rises (mind you it was close to 4:00am) or do I go to bed? My thought process: go to sleep? No way, I need to finish this paper now. And I did, but I still wasn't satisfied. I earned an "A" on the paper, which I was proud of, but I felt that I had nothing to show for it. All of the information was still so scattered. The connections were beginning to formulate, but I had not reached a level of firm understanding. It felt as if I was merely collecting the information, but I continued to search. I just knew that a time would come when all of what I had learned and experienced would finally make sense.
That time has arrived. When I read through articles in the newspaper, watch movies, listen to people talk, or analyze my own thoughts I am able to connect with the world. This is what learning is all about - making connections within the world, so that it becomes easier to understand my purpose in life. But due to the excitement of learning so much at one time, I cannot sleep. I don't want to sleep to be honest. I know I need sleep, but it might not be as much as I originally thought. I feel great, and I am healthy. There are plenty of people who need 8-10 hours of sleep, but I am fine with 5 or 6. It is not as if I wake up dysfunctional after only receiving 5 hours of rest. I am still quite capable of performing all that I need to do. And even when I do feel a little fatigued, a cup of coffee -- but never more than one per day -- keeps me alive and ready.
I have literally tried to tire myself out by doing ridiculous amounts of physical activity, but even that does not seem to work. Finding a balance is a difficult task, but something that I am slowly starting to realize about myself is that I do not need as much sleep as the average person. Really, I just want to learn, and anytime that I am not learning, I feel as if it is a waste of time. But who knows? Maybe this is just another phase that I am experimenting with and am too deeply involved to realize that it is a detriment to me. I have done that before, too many times quite frankly. But this time it feels right.
As opposed to past experiences with not getting enough sleep, I do not wake up or go through the day upset. I feel alive and well. Question: how exactly does someone feel alive? Well, for me it is a matter of embracing the opportunities that I have to learn, understand, and accept the people around me. If not, I limit myself to my own perspective, not taking advantage of the eternal wisdom that, I believe, resides in all of us. To be alive is absorb this knowledge, wisdom, and understanding, and then sharing it with others, so that they can develop ways to improve their own lives.
Sleep? Who needs it. How can I sleep when I am so inspired by the people. It is not about me, it's about we!
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