There must be a light under the bushel!

The world is too much

Wordsworth said "The world is too much with us." While I agree that we focus on material things too much and forget to appreciate our natural surroundings, I believe there is a much bigger problem, maybe just for me.

When I was younger, I always liked meeting new people and trying to experience as much as I could. I never expected perfection; instead, I appreciated people's differences. I really liked trying to figure out what made people tick and truly enjoyed the differences I discovered.

Some of my closest friends have accused me of putting others first and not thinking about myself. Don't get me wrong; I have plenty of selfish tendencies, which I just like to believe are part of my charm. However, I will, grudgingly, admit that I do a lot to make other people happy. I used to do this for people I hardly even knew. I just knew that I liked to see unhappy people become happy.

I have outgrown going too far out of my way for people whom I don't have an invested friendship with, but I think it's kinda sad. I always thought that was one of my better qualities, but it was one I had to say good-bye to simply for self-preservation. I would like to be strong enough that I could glean pleasure from the few who appreciated it and didn't take advantage of me, but the world just made me weary instead. I found that too many people just don't care about others.

I learned that many people learned fairly early in life, especially here in the U.S., that the best thing you can do is to look out for yourself first. I hate that philosophy, yet to some extent, I'm doing the same as all the others. There are so many worthwhile people in the world, but sifting through to find those people has depressed me. And, although I've always considered myself a people-person, I think I could live quietly somewhere in a secluded area with only those I love for occasional company. That's pretty sad, and I have a hard time staying sad; it's never really been in my nature to be so.