The drive there is long, as is the drive home. The morning drive is a stressful sort of long because I always get up too late and find myself trying to turn back the sun so that I can make it in time for first light. The drive home is droning and long because all I want to do is get back out there, but there’s always a week of work between me and the next weekend of deer hunting. Spending some time in the woods chasing animals has taught me some things about “pursuit” and why it is such an important part of our lives.
I believe everyone has something to pursue. Assuredly, we all have multiple pursuits laid out before us and within us. I would go as far as to say that if you are not pursuing something, then you are not fully living. I get that “pursuing something” is a broad idea, but that’s okay. Pursuit can be a career pursuit, a relational pursuit, the pursuit of a dream, the pursuit of an animal, or even the pursuit of finishing a TV series or video game. All of these can be important to someone’s state of being.
This may be a good time to mention that, yes, the pursuit can consume a person until it is an unhealthy obsession. Anything can be taken too far. But sometimes that is the point. Sometimes we need to be completely swept up in the pursuit of something. So consumed with it that we sacrifice quality of life in order to obtain it. If you don’t have something worth dying to yourself for, worth sacrificing sleep for, worth sacrificing money, time and comfort for, then you are missing out.
Another caveat I want to mention, I don’t think we always need to be obsessively pursuing something major, at every waking moment. As someone who is pretty laid back, I don’t think pursuit always looks like sweat, grit, and sacrifice. Sometimes it looks like goofing off a lot while trying to obtain whatever the thing is. Like when I’m deer hunting, ya I do a lot of hard hiking, rough driving, and intense looking and listening; but I also hang out, goof off, eat snacks, drink beer, and laugh at whatever is funny in the woods that day. It's not all blood sweat and tears. Pursuit can still be a journey, and on my journey I want some laughs.
If you’re lucky, people will partner with you at different times in your pursuit. I love tromping around in the woods alone, but oh boy, it’s a breath of fresh air when you got someone out there with ya to share the highs and lows of the experience. We should look for opportunities ourselves to join our friends in their pursuits. It’s a special thing when someone selflessly serves another’s vision. A caution, though: some people try to escape the journey of dreaming and pursuing those dreams by saying, “Oh, I love to support people in achieving their dreams.” As I said, partnering with someone in their pursuit is a special human experience, but if you find you are always the supporting actor, and never the protagonist of your own life, then you may be letting fear get in the way of your dreams.
Pursuing something forces you to better yourself. The pursuit causes you to focus your energy on getting better, faster, stronger, smarter: whatever the thing is you need. When I have my own deer tag I’m trying to fill, rather than tromping around in the woods while my brother or dad try to fill theirs, all of a sudden I’m not just following someone around in the woods. I’m listening for any branch, watching for any movement, covering the ground that looks best, not easiest. The pursuit encourages you, or forces you, to get better, not just for the sake of self-improvement, but out of a burning desire for that which you pursue. The pursuit of a dream causes you to use your time and resources wisely to get towards your dream. The pursuit of a person causes you to be selfless and learn how to make the other person feel loved. The pursuit of pizza causes you to make sure you always have just enough cash to order a pizza and tip the delivery guy.
I’ve realized recently that you are the only person who is always gonna be able to fight for you. (I mean I’ve always known that, but it’s one of those things where I know it in a different way now.) Please don’t read that in a cynical way (if you did read it in a cynical tone, please read it again in a more chill tone lol). What I’m trying to say is that although support from friends is important and welcome, at the end of the day when I’m in the woods, I’m the person that needs to find the deer and get it in my sights. And even if I have a companion who spots an animal for me, I’m the one who needs to pull the trigger. We all have a point in the pursuit that smacks us in the head and says, “You are responsible for your success or lack thereof. No one else.”
Pursuing something puts life in perspective. When you are chasing after something hard in life, it puts the other things in their respective places. When I’m done with a weekend of hunting, I think, oh work will be good because I need gas money; home will be nice because I miss relaxing; the bar will be nice because I miss hanging out with my people. The pursuit helps align other parts of my life, because it reminds me of their importance. When you sacrifice pieces of your life to pursue something, you begin to remember that those things are special and valuable.
I got the day off work, so I gotta wrap this up because I’m going hunting haha. Let me say this; pursue something. Find things that interest you, but then go past that and find the thing that gets you so stoked that you spend all your time at work thinking about it. And then go get it! Go fishing, go look for mushrooms in the woods, go play the Master Chief Collection, go make a movie, or go surfing or something. I don’t know. I don’t want this to be a cheesy charge. I’m just saying like grab a Mtn. Dew and get after it lol. Then watch as your quality of life, and the quality of your person, improves.
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