Some years are full of positive wonder, excitement, new experiences and growth. I’ve had a few of those: there were seconds, minutes and hours that turned into days, weeks and months of learning and making all the right mistakes. Yummy, yummy years.
Sure, there are years that can only be synonymous to thriving. You know that you are fully and properly alive. You’re growing into who you’re supposed to be and it’s wonderful.
2016 was one of them. But only a little and only in the first half. Mostly.
And then come the days where you force yourself to open your eyes. Knowing full well that opening them will only bring you back to being worried. Back to being scared. Back to feeling helpless.
A lot of people say that 2016 was a REALLY (REALLY!) crappy year: for the planet, individual countries and communities and within themselves. I can’t say I disagree, but the optimist in me will always want to fight back. I try very hard to see the good in all the really crappy situations. Sometimes it’s hard as hell and sometimes it just comes naturally: the balance between surviving and living.
Finding optimism at the end of 2016 did not come naturally in no way, shape or form. I’ve been worming my way through the days and sometimes I’m so sad, I just want to curl up in a ball of tears and cry until I forget the source of my tears, because my eyes now hurt more than my heart. Sometimes I cannot be the clown to cheer everyone up and sometimes I just need someone to tell me it’s going to be okay and that this, too, shall pass. I’d like to believe them. The huge lump in my throat and stomach won’t allow me and they won’t go away.
So, yes. Right now, I’m merely surviving. Trying to find the meaning and a means to truly live: despite and because of it all.
The first few days of 2017 have been pure torture. See, sometimes there are things in our lives we can’t control and right now, my life is a web of obstacles. I feel like I’m swimming in a lake full of sticky, gooey tar. It’s getting into my eyes and lungs, but I know I still have to get to the other side. The other side is the only solution, but my eyes are stuck together and it’s getting hard to breathe so I have no real sense of where I’m going.
Yes, it’s hard, but the messy black stuff only really scratches the surface. Inside, I still hold the light. The light of hope that all will be okay and that I’m exactly where I need to be. I shall get to the other side: worn out and hollow, but with so much room to grow, because now I’m wonderfully carved out. I’ll have flushed out what needs to go and find space for a fresh breath.
This experience might wear me out, but I’ll be damned if I let myself become a shell of the person I’ve become.
This, too, shall pass.
Falling into a sense of our lives being out of control and foul is really easy- scary how easy it is. Crawling towards the light (and forgive me for my cheesiness) is so goddamn hard- again: in a scary way. Things really worth doing are hard: we seem to keep forgetting that.
If you’re like me and have found yourself surviving and doing it just barely, know you’re not alone. The world of social media or just the world around you in general might have you thinking that everyone around you has it so good and that you’re the sad soul trailing behind, leaving huge gloppy tar marks. This is especially true for December when it seems like everyone is having a ball while you’re just curled up in one.
We all hurt and we all worry. Sometimes our lives bring us up and sometimes we take a tumble. Sometimes we get to experience the most kick-ass awesome, heart-striking moments and people. And sometimes we have to find the energy to survive. One day at a time.
It’s okay.
This, too, shall pass.