4.16.2015


It's true. Every day is a new start, time to dust off what was and put away yesterday in order to begin again. 

It's been a while since I posted because life got in the way. Don't you just hate it when that happens? You have plans, the best intentions, and then WHAM! Life has it's own agenda. And it really doesn't care whether it matches up with your timetable or not. I'm not one to sugar coat anything, I will tell the truth no matter how much it may sting, so let me just say that the past year has sucked.

I don't want to bore anyone with the details so we'll condense it into a sports metaphor. (To knows me is to know that I am a die hard football fanatic!) 

So, here we go...

You have made it to the playoffs. It's the fourth quarter and your team is in the lead by three. Your team has the ball and it looks like there is nothing that can upset your win. Life throws a beautiful, long spiral that you have run down an empty field to catch and the goal line is in sight when out of nowhere you are blindsided. You see the ball get intercepted. It's run back for an opposing touchdown and now you are down by three. The game clock shows all zeros. Suddenly the game is over and so are your playoff hopes. It's going to be a long off season.

Fast forward a few months. Training camp has started up again and it's time to put the past firmly behind you. It's time to put in the hard work to ensure that you make the team.

That brings us to where we are today. I am excited for the future and ready to file the past deep in the archives. However, I will never forget the lessons of the last year. While they were hardest I have ever dealt with in life, they provided me with a new outlook and a greater appreciation for, well, everything. I know it is such a cliche to say that what doesn't kill you makes you stronger but it really is so true. I wish there was a more clever way to express this sentiment but I think that it fits exactly as is. I'm still here. 

Part of my heart is still missing but what remains is more open than it used to be. I have more compassion, a deeper sense of understanding of myself and the world around me, and an ability to forgive that I didn't know existed. I am fierce and capable of surviving a hurricane. I bend but I don't break. I also found a level of complexity within my many layers that had been buried by years of putting up walls for self preservation. I now recognize that I can be a caring friend without losing myself. I realize that letting some confrontations pass without fighting them doesn't mean that I have lost my edge. It is permitted, even preferable, to allow yourself to walk away from a fight if inner peace is to ever be achieved.

It turns out that losing that playoff game in the waning minutes wasn't really the devastating blow that I thought it was. I'm not out of the game forever. I had the off season to regroup and refocus. Now, with a new direction and a renewed drive, I am ready to make the team and fight my way to the playoffs again. 

It's time to write that next chapter.