Step forward. Good, now keep moving.
Most people’s lives are a hodgepodge of their parents’ ideas, the distorted beliefs of a hollow and profoundly malnourished society, and their own good, but misguided intentions.
That hodgepodge—the soup we call “normal life”—tastes awful but we rarely say that out loud, or even to ourselves. We make shortsighted choices that cause heartache and fatigue and agony and especially apathy when we get overwhelmed.
We try to do things well. We really do. I don’t believe that people are inherently awful people, or that they are grossly lazy and selfish, or that they truly intend to harm others.
I do believe that hurt, insecure people will do anything and everything, including eviscerating those closest to them in order to salve those wounds acquired but not yet healed. Even in my own life, when people have twisted the knife, I don’t believe that they did so out of spite or outright evilness. Similarly, when I have been cowardly or inauthentic or downright heartless in engaging with people, I did not mean to confuse or hurt or mislead them.
I simply knew no better way at the time, or could not act in a way that required me to face down my fears.
There is a place where things are brighter. Where you expand into your own undeniable potential. Where you feel solidly rooted to a part of the earth. Where you can see the immense and beautiful web of people who care about you and you can trust that they will carry you when you need that. Where the world grows quiet and the chatter all falls away.
That place—the one that you long for—is the place where you stop caring whether you fail spectacularly or look really dumb or are misunderstood or come face-to-face with the gnarly reality that you need to change something really big in your life.
That place… it’s right there. Step into it.
Because we all already know how it bad feels to stay in a caustic relationship, and to work to buy stuff that we don’t even like, and to feel that gnawing hunger for something bigger and more palpable and really, really GOOD.
Do you feel that pull, too?
Good. Step forward. Now, again. Keep moving.
There’s goodness and strength and peace over there in the courageous light.
Elaine
Wow! Let me wipe my tears so I can see what I am typing. Did you write that just for me?
Wise, insightful and inspiring! Thank you!
Jodie
Oh my goodness, me too!! ❤
leeny
There is an undistorted truth that runs through each of us, but it often has to be untangled from the expectations we think people have for us and the expectations we put on ourselves to measure up to some kind of imagined sense of who we should be. If we can just travel to that quiet spot and let go of these perceived expectations and honor what we understand as true for ourselves, it’s a huge step in the right direction. But we need to be aware, listening, feeling and sensing who we really are without fear of being judged. You so eloquently captured that in your post. Thanks for the reminder to open up our hearts and challenge the brain.