"There came a time when the risk to remain tight in the bud was more painful than the risk it took to blossom.”
- Anais NinOK. Frankly, I was comfortable in the bud. Unhappy, but comfortable. Settled. Lethargic, even.
People always say - when some godawful thing has happened to you, some godawful thing that you are certain they do not understand and cannot realize the crushing implications of - that, “When life closes a door, it opens a window.” or some crap like that. And you can’t help but think, “Yeah? C’mere. I’m gonna toss you out that window.”
While I don’t recommend repeating this information to anyone who recites platitudes to you (no sense in encouraging them), over time you inevitably realize that it’s actually TRUE. Sometimes the most horrible thing that can happen to you is also the most liberating. Change is the only thing you can count on, and with it comes new life, interesting people and - in my case, anyway - travel.
It's time to face the unknown (not that I have a choice, but it makes me feel all brave and action-hero-ey to approach this like some sort of noble quest. There just aren't sufficient opportunities for noble quests in everyday life.) All hail the painful process of change and rebirth as it leads me to strange new places, a better sense of self and, far more importantly, a trimmer figure (because my priorities haven’t changed THAT much).
"Life is a process of becoming, a combination of states we have to go through. Where people fail is that they wish to elect a state and remain in it. This is a kind of death.”
- Anais Nin
It's almost unfair, isn't it? That we have to have what we think is the worst happen before we can stop worrying about it. You're right, though. Very liberating.
ReplyDeleteThis goes with your earler blog that "i'd make the same mistakes but just sooner".
ReplyDeleteIt's the truth that when one door closes another opens, in fact i think the rest of the saying goes "but often we look at the closed door so long that we don't see that another has been opened for us".
But you're right, it's like saying "shhh" to someone who's crying. You wanna say "go to hell, i wanna feel crappy right now cause i deserve it". You have to live in your sorrow for a while, really live it before you're ready to come out. Those who don't suffer don't really get the experience or the lesson that comes with it.
I wrote a blog like this once. I asked what you say to someone when you know everything you can and want to say isn't going to help. "It gets better with time".... yeah, it's true, but it's another way of saying "hey, this is gonna suck for a while and there isn't anything you can do about it".
But eventually, when you're ready to come out of your shell you realize that everything was true, in fact it does seem liberating. It almost seems encouraging, something to grasp. You think of phrases like the ones above and they start to really hold meaning to you. This is part of the healing process.
So step one - be miserable and don't feel bad for doing so.
Step two - start letting go of the miserey and embrace the liberating power of the knowledge that you made it thru this and you're still wonderful
Step three - have your friends hold down the guy who did this to you while you beat him with a padded bat.... :)