Baggage.

                     Sometimes, I want a clean slate. I don't want expectations, or preconceived notions; I want nothing. It's still strange to think about the amount of baggage I have. An 18 year old isn't supposed to have this much. I'm young; I'm supposed to be unscathed, untainted. I'm not supposed to be jaded to any degree yet.  I think some people are jaded just because they don't want to care about anything. They think that showing any kind of passion is beneath them. But some people are jaded because of experience or because of observations. Some people are jaded because they feel so much older than they should. Why do people turn out like this? I'm not "supposed" to be like this. But I hate the word "supposed". We have grown up with this idea of "normal" in our heads, and we all turn out to be anything but. That idea messes with us constantly, and makes us think were fucked up beyond repair, no matter how much we know that we are surrounded by people experiencing the same things. Being "fucked up" isn't cool. It isn't something you should brag about. But I feel like you should be proud of the things that drive you insane. They make you want to better yourself, they make you want to change things. In a world where introspection seems sparse, the thought that you are "fucked up" forces you to look inside of yourself.
                     Sometimes I'd like to start over. But I don't even know what I mean when I say start over. I appreciate things I've experienced, people I've been able to have in my life. I guess sometimes I wonder what it'd be like to exist and have no ties to anything. We love the people in our lives, but sometimes we fear disappointing them so much that we stop ourselves from going after what we want. Sometimes the people included in our baggage make us feel like we must be on the pursuit of normal, not of extraordinary. But I don't want normal things. I don't want to do what young people are "expected" to do. I know I'm not the only one. Young people are expected to be carefree, looking for the next high. But we look for a high because we have baggage, just like everyone else. Age doesn't define what we've been through. We don't just search for highs in drugs. Sometimes we search for highs in experiences, in people, in thoughts. We search for highs because sometimes we start to feel nothing. We begin to feel numb to everything around us, and it terrifies us. We just want to feel alive again. We want to feel as good as we are "supposed" to, as good as we expect to. We search for highs in places that are blatantly wrong, and in places we thought were right.  We grasp onto all of these temporary things that make us feel good, desperately hoping we'll discover something that lasts. Someday we'll get it right; if we're patient, and if we learn from what we've done.
                      Baggage is hard to face. Sometimes, we wish our baggage was this physical thing that we could just set on fire or throw off a bridge, but it isn't so easy. What we can take control of is how we treat our baggage; what we allow it to motivate us to do. A lot of us would like to pretend that it doesn't exist, that we are "normal", that we aren't complicated. Sometimes I'd like to do the same. But then I remember that my baggage doesn't have to be a burden. I remember that I appreciate it for what it's turned me into, and what it's helping me to become. I remember that it can instill the fire inside of me to want to search for more; for better. It doesn't have to stop me from wanting to try.