Throughout our lives we experience many things…
We lose jobs and start new jobs.
We start relationships and end relationships.
We live somewhere and leave somewhere.
We lose love and we find love.
We lose our way and find it again.
Our lives are a constant ebb and flow of one thing after another, of one emotion after another. Our emotions coincide with the time and place in our lives that we’re at right now. Sometimes they come and go as quickly as a summer breeze; and other times they latch onto us like burrs. And then sometimes it feels like we’re caught in a hurricane of emotions and love and loss and pain.
That’s a hard place to be because we are constantly being bombarded with new feelings all the while old emotions are festering in our hearts and in our minds. It’s also a confusing and terrifying place to be when you suddenly find yourself standing on the shore facing the tsunami waves that are about to crash down on you. When they hit they hit hard, almost crippling you as you drop to your knees while your body is wailed upon by one powerful emotion after another. And it’s very easy to get lost in the crush of the waves, and to be consumed by those emotions to the point where you feel like you’ll never be able to stand up straight again.
This is where I am at right now.
This summer has been one of tremendous loss and sacrifice for me. Losing one thing after another weighs you down in ways that you couldn’t even imagine. It crushes your heart and your dreams and if you’re not careful it can blacken your entire outlook on life. If you’re not careful you can end up being a puppet to your emotions.
We control the power that we give emotions, and the amount of influence that they have over our lives. We can choose to acknowledge them and feel them for the appropriate period of time but then let them go when they’ve run their course; or we can choose to let them define who we are and dictate how we live our lives from this point on. They can either enhance our lives or they can extinguish them. The choice is ours.
Pain and loss and grief serve a purpose for a while, but they are meant to be just a stop along the way not the final destination. Yes this has been one of the hardest summers in my life, but it is not the end. It is a season in my life, a hurricane that is passing through. While I am in it is can feel as if the world is falling apart and will never get better, like this pain is all that I will ever be able to feel for the rest of my life. But once it has passed I will be left standing in the wreckage left over. In the broken dreams and splintered hopes; but the beauty of it is that from those broken pieces I can choose to rebuild myself into something new. Into someone stronger because of the tears, into someone who is wiser because of the pain.
Emotions are powerful things, but they can only influence us as much as we allow them to. Don’t let yourself become defeated by the crushing weight of them. Remember that you can and will rebuild after this. And that you will be stronger than you ever were before.
Simply Katherina 