Have you ever really sat down and come to the realization that life really is what you make of it? Not in the cliched, off-the-cuff way that people say it to make you feel better about things. . . but in a serious, eureka kind of way.
I've found that many times, when something you've had slips away from you, it's because you were so afraid to believe that you actually had it and are so filled with fear that you are going to lose it, that you either cling too tightly to it, or don't hold on to it tightly enough. You are either afraid to claim it because of the loss you are convinced will inevitably follow, or you do take it and worry so much that you are going to lose it than you end up creating a situation where do lose it.
And when that loss finally comes, it's almost a relief, because the anxiety and the waiting for the inevitable is finally over, and you can get on with the business of dealing with it -- of telling yourself that you were never meant to have it in the first place and you always knew you were going to lose it, and you were right, and now you can move on.
But even with loss, life goes on, doesn't it? You pick up the pieces, and you trudge on, and you learn to live life without that all-important thing/person. And that's the thing about humans. . . that we do move on, we do get used to what seems even the most un-get-used-to-able things, and we are healed by time. We might occasionally feel a little tug at the mention of a name or a circumstance that brings back a poignant memory, but at the end of the day, we can get used to anything. . . and we can even learn to be happy with something that one day we thought we could never settle for, or be happy without something we thought we could never live without.
Cheesy and sappy as this is, these extracts from this poem by Veronica Shofffstall do make some sense, so don't look down your nose at me (Caveboy and Nev -- I can almost see the rolling eyes)!!
After a while you learn the subtle difference
between holding a hand and chaining a soul
And you learn that love doesn't mean leaning
and company doesn't always mean security
And you begin to learn that kisses aren't contracts
and presents aren't promises
And you begin to accept your defeats
with your head up and eyes ahead . . .
And you learn to build all your roads on today
because tomorrow's ground is too uncertain for plans
and futures have have a way of falling down in mid-flight. . .
And you learn that you really can endure
that you really are strong
and you really do have worth
And you learn and you learn
with every goodbye you learn..
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4 comments:
I happen to agree with you, although yes, you're right, I do find poems like the one you included in your blog to be a bit cheesy. But actually, I do like that poem. I discovered it in high school (we all need things like that in high school what with the hormones and the teenage blues).
There's a part of the poem which you didn't include but which I really like:
"After awhile you learn that even sunshine
Burns if you get too much."
I agree with you generally. Ultimately, human beings do move on, they come to live with anything, and they adapt.
I disagree with you about the part of the self-fulfilling prophecy of losing something. When something/ someone is important to you in your life, you don't take it/him/her for granted. But you don't make that thing/ person the center of your life in the sense that you lose completely your own identity. Things/ people don't have to be lost . . .
I agree that when something/someone is important to you, you don't take it/them for granted. And you don't need to make them the center of your life.
But what I'm talking about (and this is by no means universal) is the feeling of near disbelief that you have it/them, and the almost subconscious belief that it's too good to be true, and you either don't take ownership because of the fear that because it feels too good to be true, it must be. Or you are determined not to lose it/them that you hold on too tight, end up suffocating them, and losing them anyway.
Again, obviously, most people don't function this way, but some do.
I assume that this blog entry was about losing someone who was special to you. I could never relate to it because I would never allow my feelings to be dictated to that extent by my relationship with someone else. However your thoughts did hit close to home at another more intimate level. They articulated quite perfectly the feeling of losing a part of myself.
At the risk of sounding self-absorbed, I must say that the latter experience is even more torturous than the former. All my life I had strived to build my identity based on what I admired and respected. Even after that identity was forged, it was hard to not look askance at it as if looking at a stranger. Being used to that which was deficient, it was hard to get acquainted with something that was worthy of respect. Always wary of the color of my own perspective, it was difficult to celebrate that which I had as good despite the admiration of many . Ever fearful of slipping back into an imperfect past, the present was full of strife in order to stave off the decrepitude that tomorrow would surely bring. My efforts, though fast and furious, were impotent against the inexorable passage of time. In fact they worked against me, ravaging my body and soul and consuming me with their intensity. In the end I was condemned to a slow yet painless death that came about suddenly like one whose ascent to the peak is cruelly severed and cast into the darkness, forever to fall.
I can, to an extent, understand what you are saying, though I don't think I've ever striven for the level of perfection that you have. But I think most people have, at some point in their lives, feared the loss of something they have worked hard, and sacrificed much, to obtain. I guess the greater the change from past to present, the greater the fear that it will slip away from you, and the greater the price you pay if it does.
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