What can you see around you?

For ten years I have lived in a city where not much changes.  That's partly by design, in that those who make the decisions that affect change actively stand in the way of those decisions.  It's hard to go into more detail on that without getting specific about where I live which I don't want to do.  The point is, things like planning applications are quite strict here, there are 27 churches within a 1 mile radius of my house - I know, I counted - and the many denominations they represent seem to have a collective conservative mentality when it comes to anything that would progress the city.  That has been changing in recent years as the council area was expanded and their influence has been weakened.

Despite the fact that very little changes, you would imagine I and many of the people who live here would know this city very well, the reality is we do not.  That's not due to anything specific to the people who live here, it is something I have found time and again in other cities, the people that live there are often less observant than those who visit, and those who live there are far less likely to have actually visited any of the places that are considered tourist attractions, it comes as no surprise the tourists are more likely to visit tourist attractions - that should be self evident.

You would imagine however than someone who has lived here all their life, say forty years, would know more about the city than someone who has come to visit and spent all of forty minutes in it.  It's a point of humility to actually admit when that isn't the case.  When you realise there's so much to see all around you that despite standing in front of, or walking passed, maybe every single day, you have never truly seen the world around you.

As a thought experiment, and as a task or piece of "homework" I would like you to take the time to stop and think and look, and see what is there around you that people would come and see?  Even if you live out in the sticks and think nobody would ever come and visit, don't be so sure about that, I've seen enough people with a desperate desire for complete isolation to know that even the most remote place in the world will still appeal to someone.

Our desire to escape the world we live in can override our consciousness and lead us to a state of mind where we focus so much on what we could have, where we could go, and how different our lives could be, that we become blind to what we do have, where we can already go, and what our lives really are here in this moment.  I'm in a reflective mood at the moment, recent events have left me with something of an existential crisis which was to be expected.  That question that lingers with you throughout your life poling its head out in these moments is at the forefront of my mind more than ever right now - what am I doing with my life?

I wish I could give you an answer to that question but the truth is, I don't even have an answer myself, everything that comes to mind is trivial and nothing that feels like it is of any great importance.  If anything, I'm coming to a greater realisation that I have been going through the motions for some time now following a routine, living but not really feeling alive.  I know that sounds melancholy and depressing but I'm really not in a dark state of mind right now, I would describe my mentality more as being one of indifference, a quiet moment of reflection where I actually stand back and look at my life without any filter and say to myself okay, what is this? - like Karen in Will and Grace, "Honey what's this, what's happening, what's going on here?"