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Coming home for break always leads to the inevitable: reminiscing. Don’t get me wrong, I am an extremely nostalgic person and love to do so, but at the same time, sometimes I hate remembering. Not the point. My room in my house is currently in shambles because there are three girls in it, with one moving back home to get started on her clinicals, one in high school, and me just living for brief periods of time. Because of this, I have stuff all over the place, and since this was my room in high school, I have a lot of high school memorabilia making its way to the surface of the clutter. I happened to find my senior year newspaper, and read it cover to cover, enjoying it just as much as I did three years ago. One thing that stuck out to me in an article “10 years from now….” And it had so-and-so doing this, yada yada yada, and something that caught my eye was “10 years from now, I will be anywhere but here.”
This caught my attention, because of course, at one point or another, we have all felt this. Things aren’t going right with school, friends, work, family, etc., and it’d be nice to get away. I think for high schoolers, it was just us wanting to get the hell outta there in its entirety. However, as much as you want to get out of somewhere, if you can’t, you can’t, and you have to accept it and make the best of what’s around. I know it’s hard to imagine, trust me, I’ve been there. But if you continuously think about how someday will be amazing and someday you’ll have your life figured out and someday you will be happy, you will be missing out on today. Cliche, right? But, you can’t deny they truthfulness of the statement. If you are always planning how things will be in your life one day, you are not focusing on the life you are currently living, and maybe if you did, you wouldn’t want to leave it so much. (I know, I know, some people would still want to leave.) However, looking back on high school and how much I wanted to get out near the end, I loved it. Sure, it wasn’t the greatest at some points and I had all bright plans for college, (don’t get me wrong, I LOVE college), but, if I hadn’t complained about where I was and just lived it and enjoyed it, maybe I could have seen a little bit clearer that high school was pretty awesome, too. (And don’t misunderstand my take on high school, I loved it, but at the end I was incredibly ready to leave; and I was in good company.) That is something that I have learned through trial and error. Be present. Once these days are gone, you cannot get them back no matter how bad you want them. So, while you’re in them, be in them. Don’t be desperately clutching onto the past or constantly planning for the future, but live in the moment. (Cliche, I know! But, again, true.) I think right now, that is the best piece of advice I could give anyone. Don’t just exist, but live. Be present. “Imagining the future is a kind of nostalgia. (…) You spend your whole life stuck in the labyrinth, thinking about how you’ll escape it one day, and how awesome it will be, and imagining that future keeps you going, but you never do it. You just use the future to escape the present.” - John Green, Looking for Alaska There are two schools of thought when you see this: grief and relief. I believe that both are important, and both need to be addressed.
Grief. Everyone, those moments that you feel infinite, the times where you laugh so much that you stomach hurts, the amazing times with beautiful people, the good ole days… they end. It sucks, but it’s true. However, knowing this, cherish these days, and know that nothing lasts forever. Life goes on, and you can’t be stuck in the past or you will miss out on your future. So love the people who treat you right, and TELL them. Recognize the good people in your life, and hold onto them dearly. If fate has it that they will not be in your future, hold onto the memories dearly, but don’t forget to make new memories. “I wish there was a way to know you’re in the good old days before you’ve actually left them.” Props to The Office for this quote. It holds so much significance. Understand that we often realize the good times too late, so take advantage of the good in your life. Go out and make your life what you want it to be. Be courageous, act on your feelings, dance in the rain, sing loudly, be spontaneous, take risks, fail, try again, go on adventures, love, LIVE. But just remember, nothing lasts forever, so cherish the good days when you are actually in them. Relief. On the opposite side of being sad that the good days in your life won’t last, remember that that is true for the bad times as well. If you are struggling with something and don’t ever see a way out of it, remember, this hardship will end. It may not be today, it may not be tomorrow, hell, it might not even be a year from now, but it will end. Believe that. And actively try to make your life the life you want it to be. Surround yourself with people who only bring you up, challenge you, and make you the best possible version of yourself. If you don’t like your situation, change it! If that isn’t an option, escape through reading, writing, or in the comfort of friends or family. Everyone has bad days as well as good. While you think no one could possibly ever experience what you are going through, and while you are right, because we all experience life differently, remember that there are people who have gone through hardships and can relate. They may not have been the same type of hardship, expressing how you are feeling to someone else is so much better than bottling it up. No one wants to be lonely, and the entire human race is trying desperately to find a person to share their feelings with and to not feel as lonely as they do. Make sure you don’t push that person out because of your bad days. Remember, these says will end. You have to be willing to accept the good in your life! Stay strong! Needless to say, I haven’t been journalling like I used to. School and nannying take up more time than ever. But, seriously, this is the first year that I’m like WOAH, I’m in college… I can’t just study the night before and do fine on a test. Instead it’s like okay, my anatomy test is in 4 days, let’s start studying multiple hours a day and then still stay up really late the night before! It is really interesting stuff, though, because four out of my six classes pertain to my major, however, it’s just way more time consuming. Then, on top of that, if I miss one night of journaling I always think, okay, now I’ll just add that onto my next journal entry, and then I don’t have time because I know it’s going to be longer and then it just spirals out of control and in the past two months I have journaled like four times. So, let’s see what I’ve missed!
Since the last time I journaled I:
The quote from above was said by William Arthur Ward, and I believe it is important to think about, because in today’s world, we complain about what we don’t have. It’s easy to do that, look at what you don’t have, no matter how trivial it is, and complain. However, we don’t often take too much time to stop, think, and appreciate what we do have. And that is why Thanksgiving is one of my absolute favorite holidays. Okay, okay, the immense amounts of potatoes in every form are a plus too… But, Thanksgiving is when everyone steps back, gets together, and is thankful for what they have. So here are a few things that I am extremely thankful for:
My family. Everyone says this, as they should, but when I say family, I do not just mean blood. By family, I mean everyone that I have allowed into my life, and who has made me a part of theirs. I am so blessed to be surrounded by amazing people that bring me up and make me the best version of myself. For all the people in my life, I will be eternally grateful, and words cannot express my love for you. Opportunities. I am increasingly thankful for this. I am so thankful for the opportunity to go to school, and every single thing that is impacted by this. The people I’ve met, the possibilities that come with it, and the ability that it gives me to further pursue knowledge. With my education, I also get the opportunity to live of my dream of helping people, to be able to afford all the traveling I want to do, and to just learn! I want to always expand my knowledge, not to be a know-it-all, but to simply learn. I never want to stop learning, which means I will never stop failing, picking myself back up and trying again. Resilience brings about opportunity, and people need to be aware of that. Failing is not a bad thing. However, failing and giving up is ceasing to live, discover, and explore. Anything amazing in life is going to take work, and chances are you will fail. It all depends on how you pick yourself up after you fail that matters. The journey is what matters, not the destination. Relationships. This is tied in with the people in my life who are family, but I want to expand. I am so incredibly thankful for the relationships that I have developed in my life, and more recently at Rockhurst. I have met people that have become my family and I know they will be in my life forever. On the flip side of my friends-to-family relationships, I am also thankful for the relationships that did not work out. Sounds weird, right? And don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t jumping for joy not being friends with people, but people grow apart. It’s part of life. People change, we all move along. Based on these relationships that weren’t made for the long run, I am thankful that for the things they have taught me. Part of it is resilience, because becoming a stranger to someone you once considered a close friend really does take it out of you. But you can’t let it make you be afraid to get to close to anyone else. I was afraid of that for a while, but I realize that people come in and out of our lives. I truly do believe that everyone that comes in and out of my life serves a purpose, and while they may no longer be in my life, they will forever be in my heart. I am so blessed in my life and myself, as well as most people, need to take a step back and appreciate what we do have and not focus on what we want. |
AuthorJust a twenty-something attempting to create the illusion that I have a clue what's going on... Archives
May 2017
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