June 5, 2006

Life throws you some curveballs. And they always seem to come rapid fire right in a row like you’re standing in a batting cage instead of being spaced out so you can breathe. Last week was like that for me. Kind of makes you wake up and realize what’s really important—the slap in the face we all sometimes need. It’s so easy to get jealous of what other people have—or what it looks like they have—so easy to get caught up in what everyone else is doing. If you don’t feel good about yourself, it’s natural to compare yourself to others and come up short. Then you beat yourself up, call yourself a loser because you didn’t do this or that, weren’t there when such and such happened, and are therefore not hip or cool or interesting. It’s easy to find fault with yourself, so hard to tell yourself you’re special and unique just the way you are. That all the experiences you have had in your life—the good and the bad—have brought you to where you are now. One thing done differently, one choice you might have made could have led you down a completely different path. Easy stuff to say— much, much harder to internalize and make real to yourself. This world beats you down, it sands down the rough edges, it wills you to conform and surrender and shuffle along meekly and unquestioningly. So much harder to forge your own path in life, to not care what other people think, to come to your own conclusions about yourself and your place in the world. And people have agendas, they will suck you in and milk you dry and tramp you down and break your spirit. It will happen. But it is the journey, not the arrival that matters. Eyes on the prize and all that. We are walking in the footsteps of those who have gone before. It’s the truth. Believe it. But more importantly, believe in yourself. That is the hardest thing of all.