The world is my vice

There's something about getting older than makes me take a step back and judge things objectively rather than subjectively. I think for the past year, I've found experiences, people and places to be fascinating and worthy of understanding which I might've overlooked otherwise. It seems as if I've the lost temporary but prolonged fear I gained when I moved out on my own; and frankly, it's a good feeling. I think an essential component of life is experience and permitting your steps to be taken outside of a comfortable area. Growing the desire to push forward in life and perceiving yourself as an integral part of the world are of deep, deep significance for one's well being. You must value your life, see it as a gigantic jenga game, and apply that rule to your happiness amongst the billions of others you will never meet but have a deeply significant relation to. Everyone has a battle, inwards or outwards, we are all facing difficulties, obstacles, decisions, misfortunes, winnings... even the richest, seemingly happy people fight battles whether they speak of it or not. We must understand that we are all together and related in ways we will never completely comprehend but still find fascinating and worthy of respecting.

I know what I'm saying now is in a way contradictory of my long held beliefs that we are NOT equal, and that we are meant to be separate. I feel in love with Ayn Rand's philosophy that the intelligent and highly valuable people of society should be separated and kept together in order to maintain the motor of the world but really, it's too idealistic and frankly, impossible. I still find her writing and philosophies to be on a level of genius that I will forever respect and and very partially agree with but alas, there will never be a hidden an imaginary valley in Colorado reserved for the great minds of the world to escape to. We should eliminate our need to "escape" from the seemingly mediocrity of what surrounds us because really, everything is beautiful. It's so beautiful that I almost can't take it. Even the tiny leaves on the tree in front of my apartment building fill me with such joy. I've always had this need to be reminded that the world is still running, people are still going about their lives, and nothing has changed. It's the reason why I keep my window open when I sleep, to hear the sounds of the world before I fall into a slumber... so I can drift into another bizarre world while the real one is still alive and well, patiently waiting for me to awake. I think my growing appreciation of life and everything that surrounds me is the true joy in one's being, or at least in mine. We all find appreciation and love in what we are drawn towards... well, the entire world is my vice. I am addicted to the world and everything about it, all the horrors, the wonders, the beauty, the love, the hatred, all facets of it. I love it all.