There is no future
There is no past
Thank god this moment’s not the last
There’s only us, there’s only this
Forget regret, or life is yours to miss
No other road
No other way
No day but today
As we go into the New Year, I find that 2015 is still packing some punches in the lesson department.
I’ve been having a harder time lately than I like to admit. Nothing has felt quite on kilter, nothing has felt quite on the rails; I’ve not known why. I still don’t completely know why. I have often felt somewhat conflicted within myself, I am always trying to balance everyone else, but that’s not a selfless desire: having those close to me in balance makes my life easier. I try to fix others because it makes it easier to fix myself. But the thing is, you can’t fix the world, you can’t mediate it, and as much as you love it, you can’t always protect it, not even from itself.
We always have a choice in life, we can keep everything guarded to ourselves and hope that all the strands we are trying to hold together will somehow magically know how to repair themselves, we can try and fix everything and everyone until we get emotional whiplash from trying to hold everything steady…or, we can trust someone enough to tell them what’s going on. And that can be the hardest thing in the world; what if they don’t get it, what if they laugh in your face, what if they call you a drama queen. Sometimes just telling someone that you need help with the burden is the bravest choice you can ever make. Sometimes the hardest thing you can say is
Please, please I need your help
And sometimes you have to tell someone that you can’t fix it yourself anymore, that you’ve tried your best, but the fight either isn’t yours or isn’t one you can win, and you either pull yourself off the battlefield, or you find a companion at arms to help you lift that sword.
Life isn’t about the past, it isn’t even about the future, it’s about what you do with this very moment that you have now. How you choose to face or not face your problems, how you choose to deal or not deal with your misunderstandings and your pain and your grief and confusion, and your happiness and joy and self-sacrifice. No one can know anything unless you tell them, no one is that kind of physic, if someone wounds you, or confuses you, or insults you, tell them so, and if someone tells you the same in kind, accept that with dignity, fix the issue, address the dragon, and move on…
You cannot control what anyone else thinks of you, or what anyone else thinks of anybody. You cannot control who loves who or who accepts who, but you can control how you react, you can control what you choose. You can control which battles you think are worth facing, and no one else can make that choice for you…
But please, whoever you are, never be afraid to just ask for help, because that doesn’t make you weak, that makes you strong.
And there is, after all, no better day than today…