I have the greatest friends on earth. I know everyone says that, but clearly, they are mistaken. Unless, of course, they are friends with the same people that I am. Then they are right on target.

While I was trying in vain to make myself feel whole again in 2007, my friends were right there with me. They offered up many solutions of their own. Unfortunately, none of those worked either.

The problem with having your friends try to make you feel better, is that nothing they say or do will be right. It isn't your friends' fault, of course. They are chock full of tricks that have helped THEM over the years. They also seem to think that if YOU had what THEY have, then you would be happy. The thing is, their dreams aren't your dreams. Their wishes aren't your wishes. Their life isn't necessarily the life you want for yourself.

Its especially hard when you are in a place where you don't even know what your wishes and dreams are, anymore. You don't know what you want, you only know that some things you don't want. It almost seems egotistical: "I have no idea what I want, but it isn't the life my best friend has." It's not, though. You aren't saying that your undiscovered dreams are better than your friends', just different. Now, if you could only figure out what they are!

At some point near the end of 2007, I started to think that maybe I was trying to fill my yearning with the wrong things. If I couldn't fill the emptiness with food or exercise or work or writing or reading or relentless pacing around the house; if I couldn't fill it with what my friends had or what they wanted for me, then maybe I should stop trying so hard to fill the emptiness up. Maybe I should just leave it alone and let it resolve on its own. Maybe I should stop obsessing about what I should be feeling or where I should be in life.

Maybe I should just structure my life not around fixing myself but around discovering myself. And that's how I came up with my master plan for 2008.