Life Is Hard. It Doesn’t Always Have To Be Quite This Hard.
I don’t know anyone who isn’t struggling.
The issues and needs are as different and complex as we are, yet it’s a daily slog for many if not most. Even friends or family who appear to be sailing by, trust me…their sails are fighting a storm.
I just read about several young people who had aged out of foster care, each left with nothing. Aging out happens in many states when a teen turns 18; others 21. And in many situations, they lose their case manager and all support. It’s a dreadful situation and a system that needs a major overhaul but that’s a discussion for another time. These young people often don’t even receive the financial benefits to which they’ve been entitled.
One young woman touched a nerve, hearing her say she found herself living in a tent on the street near a highway for months. While working a part-time job. And taking college classes online. Committed to and pushing for her college degree, even with the curveballs continuing to come her way. Talk about fighting a storm.
Nothing but overwhelming respect for her, still in her teens, knowing her self-worth and having self-respect despite everything she’s experienced and is experiencing. She knows this path is her way out of this storm and that it will change the trajectory of her life moving forward.
We know about unrelenting stress. It weakens our core. Pushes and pulls our bodies, hearts, and minds often to the breaking point. None of us gets through life without experiencing it and some many times over. It challenges us to either give in and turn up the wheels on our car or to say the hell with it and keeping moving ahead.
These people are all around us even though we may rarely see or hear about them. Many are in our own families. Our close friends. Our colleagues. That’s why the expression about everyone fighting a battle is so powerful. It also helps to level the playing field when we think everyone else is living the high life and we’re barely scraping by, thinking there’s no solution…no way up and out…no way for a do-over.
Children. Young people. Adults. Parents. Caregivers. Elders. No one skates by without struggles, pain, and setbacks. Like everyone else, I’ve had more than my share and in some ways, still do. Yet my mother demonstrated by her actions that you keep standing up. You keep striving for better. So many times she wanted to give up, but she never did. Oh she was down quite a few times, but she was a fighter. I suppose this is one of her life gifts to me…to keep going. It’s also why I continue to encourage and support others to do the same, even during the darkest times, and not to succumb or give up.
Someone very dear to me has spent over a decade sliding into a cavern, apparent to those who knew this person and the path upon which this person had been walking. The loss of momentum and plans were most clear, yet it’s the loss of self-respect that stings the most.
Life morphed from plans for the future to focusing on the daily issues we all deal with…paying bills, having food to eat, putting gas in our car. The parts of life requiring us to be practical and pragmatic, yet it’s not enough. Without eyes to the future, it’s far too easy to make excuses and say this is it. This young woman living in a tent and striving for college is testament enough that more is not only possible, but it’s how we live up to our capabilities. And dreams.
It’s hard to make changes. It’s harder to stay put.
It’s hard to look ahead. It’s harder not to.
Someone posted something and while I don’t know the author, it’s worth reposting part of it…
Being in debt is hard. Being financially disciplined is hard. Choose your hard.
Communication is hard. Not communicating is hard. Choose your hard.
Life will never be easy. It will always be hard.
But we can choose our hard. Choose wisely.
It’s not easy to take a good look at ourselves with an objective eye. Our minds are often our worst enemies, telling us things that are both inaccurate and harmful. But our minds can also be the engine, urging us to look at ourselves with blunt honesty through a new lens. Where we are. What we’re doing. When to make changes. How to step out of our box and take a risk into the world. Easy? No. Incumbent upon us? You bet.
We hear the word courage and automatically think of those who serve and protect us. Those who risk themselves for our well-being. Yet courage also applies to us being honest with ourselves. Recognizing that we need to change our path, even one step at a time.
Courage is the opposite of fear which can hold us hostage moreso than handcuffs. Because we allow it into our thinking, behavior, and choices. But here’s the thing…we have agency over our lives while we’re still here and this is the greatest power imaginable. To change ourselves. Our situations. Our environments. Our paths. Easy? No. Possible? Yes. This young woman who lived in a tent tells us just this.
The poet Charles Bukowski said, in part, this…
Nobody can save you but yourself and you’re worth saving.
It’s a war not easily won but if anything is worth winning then this is it.
Only you can save yourself. Do it! Do it!
Then you’ll know exactly what I am talking about.
What seems like the easy way is anything but. Relinquishing yourself to circumstances rather than, as Dylan Thomas said, “rage against the dying of the light” is the antithesis of having courage. It’s in us all. We just need to dig down and grab it. If you keep the bar low, you’ll be walking on it. Far wiser to keep it high and continue reaching for it.
Yes…life is hard but it doesn’t need to be this hard for endless days, weeks, months, and years.
You are the light. You have the power. Every day gives you just this. Don’t waste it.
www.debraischafer.com
