This How We Live
Life isn’t clean, it’s actually quite wrinkled, messy, and disheveled. We can try our very best to wash away its impurities, organize it with precision, and purge as much literal and figurative baggage as possible. But every time things seem to be in good working order within our personal standards, interests, and needs, something happens to make it untidy and disorderly yet again. If we can simply accept the fact that life itself isn’t contained in a neat and delicately presented package with all the trimmings and frills but rather is a tattered cardboard box that it bursting at its seams, we actually have received the best gift of all.
From a very young age, we’re taught to believe that life is something that we must live, not something that lives inside of and along side of us. Family, friendships, studies, work, relationships, and the every day responsibilities shape and create our experiences—for better or for worse. When we believe that we are not in control of the choices we make but rather must endure and accept the lot in life we’ve been given, we’re truly not living but rather simply existing and our spirit is slowly dying. There is the balance of allowing things to progress, shift, and change in its natural progression but also making decisions that are informed in the development of one’s present and creation of one’s future. There is the balance of staying the course, but knowing when it’s time to veer in whatever direction is being revealed that ultimately serves for a higher purpose. Mistakes don’t necessarily exist, but rather a series of lessons. These lessons that we learn day by day are neutral—but it’s our perspectives and life experiences that render them “good or bad” based upon our judgment and the judgment of others.
When we decide to give up control, but are self-protective and self-aware to decide what feels good and appears to provide us with a sense of well-being and value, we are living. The details and outcome no longer become important. It’s the process of elimination, the quieting of self-doubt, and ultimately taking ownership of one’s actions that crafts our unique and rightful paths that we walk with more ease and less anxiety.
If I can impart one solid piece of advice, it would be this: no more over thinking, over processing, and fighting wars within one’s self. Nothing is fixed and everything changes. The people that love and accept you will remain. Those who reject you don’t have a place within your life unless you continue to permit it. Work, success, financial means, and status aren’t the defining factors of a person’s character. It’s the heart and mind. So go out and live…for it actually is a beautiful yet mysterious miracle we’re granted daily. Yet it’s ours to experience and interpret collectively and according to our individuality.