Monday, June 9, 2014

Sometimes "Everything" is an adage

As many of you who read my blogs may have noticed, I've had an emotional couple weeks. While yes, I do tend to write in generalities, I do actually write from life experiences ... mainly to refocus my brain in a more positive manner!

There are so many events and situations that have occurred over these past few weeks, I feel like I'm spinning in a never ending emotional tornado at times.

My boyfriend made a comment the other day regarding stresses of his own, "I know all of this is supposedly happening for a reason or lesson. How do I determine what that is?!" That, is the ultimate question for which there is no clear answer. Some people say "that which doesn't kill you makes you stronger." Others say "it takes a truly strong person to cry, to let things out, and to attempt to move forward with life." Still others say "You're only as strong as you choose to allow yourself to be," and even other people say "you make the bed, you gotta lie in it!" After much thought, introspection, and consideration, I believe a combination of all these to be true. Allow me to explain ....

While everything we do in life is, in reality, an active choice we make at that time, and how we choose to handle the repercussions or glories of those choices are no one's responsibility but our own, there are many situations in life that occur completely out of our control. Some are great, some are horrid, some are euphoric, and some resemble the depths of hell. I said in a previous blog that it was told to me that our Feelings are never wrong, our Actions resulting from and our Reactions to those feelings are what make the difference.

Personally, I've made some really stupid, horrible decisions in life, but I've made some incredibly fantastic, fabulous ones too. We all have. At times we all feel hopeless or hopeful, like a failure or a complete success, sad or happy, elated and ambitious or in the depths of despair.  A person pointed out to me recently "I've watched you lose everything", yet I've gained so much!  I lost my job via illness and layoff, but gained my sanity and life direction. I lost my car, but gained freedom in so many ways including walking through a park daily to get home just because it's there and I don't have the transportation crutch of a car to keep me from choosing not to. If "losing everything " is mainly to do with the things that can be bought, well, they're worth losing to make room for better, more important things.

I choose to be a mom and do the best I can for my children daily. That may not always be monetary ability, but they talk to me, we have amazing times together by mutual choice, and I try to be there for them with an open ear and open mind no matter what. I choose to live with the man that I love and adore. Every day may not be perfect bliss, but we are each others' trust, rock, and absolutely the "yin to each other's yang". I choose to be a full time student, not only to ultimately have a true career in an area I'm interested in and passionate about, but also to set the example for my kids that it's never too late to go back and complete what was started in the first place or to be what you truly should and wanted to be in the first place. I live in a place and area of this city that I love, my partner is the love of my life, I'm fascinated by what I study in school, I get paid to choreograph, dance, act, and paint ... I simply don't see the aforementioned loss of "Everything".

Recently I watched my youngest child go through "graduation" ceremonies from elementary to middle school. I cried. Yep, I did. I cried with pride for all he's accomplished, and mommy worry over all that he has yet to experience that I'll not be able to protect him from. I felt nostalgia for those moments in his childhood when he would run immediately to me if anything scary in his life occurred. My hope for him is that he learns the lessons I've learned at an earlier age than I.

In response to the original adages, if you're not physically killed by it, can find a way to get whatever "it" is out of your system through cathartic and/or positive activities, push forward to better yourself in whatever way possible, admit your faults and pay your dues for those faults if needed, treat others in the same empathic manner in which you yourself would hope to be treated, and to simply put your feet on the ground to attempt to move forward daily, there's no way that those universal reasons won't reveal themselves in due time.

~ The Girl In The Little Black Dress

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