It’s a beautiful new day and you are in love with life and life is in love with you.
It’s a shitty awful day and you don’t feel in love with life but life is still in love with you.
Which one?
All this is life.
You are life. Life is you. Life is me. There is nothing without life. The originator, the force, the movement, the soul, the energy, the divine: it is in you, me, all of us, all of everything.
Even the pain and the tearing apart and the uncertainty and the absolute ripping open, even the wound that goes down to the bone: all this, too, is life.
Pain is beautiful, pain is a gift, pain is a reminder that you exist, that you are here, that you are alive.
No, I don’t like it either. But we can learn to accept pain, to be grateful for it, the way we are grateful for medicine, or pooping. Maybe it’s bitter, maybe it stinks: but we need it.
Pain wakes you up. Discomfort keeps you awake.
Do you want life? Do you want growth? This is what you are asking for: pain, discomfort, uncertainty, tension.
Tension keeps you awake.
You are awake! You are alive! You are here! You are now!
It is not what you expected!
“This is not the adventure I ordered,” you say.
Life smiles and nods. “Yes, it is.”
Can you accept that whatever surrounds you is exactly what you have created, have brought into being? Is exactly what you have given yourself?
If it is pain, maybe you are trying to wake yourself up, to heal the wound you have carried too long by poking it over and over until you quit resisting and avoiding, until you quit running, until you sit still and go to it, look at it, embrace it, love what it means to you: it means that you are alive. You have survived it. You have persisted. You cannot be stopped. You are alive. You are alive.
You are here in this tapestry, infinitely complex, this indescribable fabric of life. Maybe you are surrounded now by all the grays of giving up or the harsh reds of anger. You want the cool blues of rest and the mellow greens of fruitful growth.
“This is not the adventure I ordered,” you say.
Life chuckles, not unkindly. “Oh, but it is.”
You are still in it, maybe too close to see it. You are still breathing.
The story is not over. This story is not over. Your story? Not even close to over.
It is not over because you are writing it, you are living it, you are it.
You the Author, You the Hero, You (also) the Villain: the threads weave together, the plot unfolds, and it may all seem disconnected but it isn’t.
It may seem, at times, like the story is over. But as long as you keep waking up, the story isn’t over.
The adventure you ordered serves itself up. Dig in.
Annie Mueller is a writer, reader, seeker of growth, and transplant to Puerto Rico, where she lives with her best friend and their four children. Her crash course in self-discovery came from experiencing job loss, financial devastation, Hurricane Maria and its aftermath, and major surgery—all in less than a year. She writes about creativity, personal growth, and spirituality; runs Prolifica, a content management consultancy for small teams and solo professionals; and sends out a popular weekly newsletter about feelings and freelancing. You can find more of her work on her website.
Image courtesy of Allef Vinicius.
