Summer is finally here and
the longer days are consuming more of my time outdoors and in the garden. I
don’t want to waste a second when there is so much living to do…and for maybe
the first time in my life, writing has taken a backseat to the actual insights
of living being served up every day. I’ve used pictures instead for fear I
might miss out on something if I took the time to write it down.
I’ve been on a bit of a
bender lately (minus the booze…well okay, a little bourbon goes well with most
things) and have learned that it really isn’t about what challenges you face in
life. It has everything to do with what you consider a challenge. And finding
my way had more to do with realizing I was already exactly where I needed to be
and not in need of a roadmap as to which direction to take.
There is a little bit of
Dorothy (by way of the Good Witch Glenda’s observation), a dash of Mary
Poppins, and yes…even the character portrayed by Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman.
I reached a resting point
recently after waking up one day to find I had a completely different view of
the world I’ve lived in for most of my adult life. I wish I could tell you what
changed, but it was so subtle. I wasn’t holding my mouth right (old fishing
saying for when the fish aren’t biting and one that a friend has coined often).
It used to bug me to hear it. Never made sense. It was too simplistic in
explaining how an activity or event did not net the expected results. And it
pissed me off to boil it down to something that had no substance or tangible
explanation I could sink my teeth into. Because really…I’ve been a gal that
needs to find deep meaning and reason in every single thing. And stuff that
doesn’t make sense has been quite the Achilles heel for me. To keep order in my
life, I needed to be able to rationalize the “why” behind every aspect of my
life. WTF was my past response. I now must concede that it is indeed that
simple and complex all at once. Living life with this ecosystem proved
exhausting for me. Another phrase I used to detest was “it is what it is.” I
have also come to appreciate this as sound guidance for various points in my
life where my sheer will to make something happen would have been so much better
served to accept and keep going. And as I sit and write this now, I can see
that I’m making up for lost time and likely going too long and too deep to keep
anyone entertained and interested to the end.
I’ve been on a road trip for
a while now. What most don’t realize, though, is my particular journey was
unique in that it required me to take the journey standing still. Instead of
searching outwardly through experiences and living, I became an observer of
pretty much everything I encountered. I also had to have a willingness to put
up a white board and erase all past foundational belief systems (including
societal norms and expectations).
Having come full circle in
deconstructing the life I once lived, I am at the crossroads where I must
choose where I take it from here. It’s a little bit of “You’ve had the answer
all along” from Glenda, and a twist of “It was here all along in my own
backyard” from Dorothy. Throw Mary Poppins in the mix with an innate ability to
spin anything negative into a positive and you can pretty much sum up who I am
and where I’ve been.
Life didn’t change me nearly
as much as I thought it had. In fact, I think life is the constant we all work
with. We are the lens that reacts and reflects what we see (sometimes through
filters we don’t even know exist). Life doesn’t discriminate. We are all equals
in what we start with at the very beginning…that is to say we get this life, we
are born, and we find our way.
I’ve learned that working
with life and following a natural flow is far better than swimming against the
current and denying whatever current reality I am in the middle of.
The final observation comes
from admitting that there are people in my life, who simply don’t “get” me any
longer. And that’s okay. It’s also proven far easier to simply let go than to
try to rationalize my chosen path. That brings me to the final comparison,
which is the hooker, who Julia Roberts played in Pretty Woman. Richard Gere
stops and asks her for directions and she tells him it will cost him. Indignant,
he says she can’t charge him for directions. And in true form of someone who is
comfortable in her own skin, she simply says, “I can do anything I want. I
ain’t lost.” Kudos to Roberts for delivering that line and ‘nuff said for where
I am in my own life. I might be in the middle of a journey, but I ain’t lost.
And yes, I can do anything I want!
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