I’ve read enough by now to know that this is the best of times. The grind. The way-finding. The devotion. This is what people wish they could go back and relive.
I’ve also lived enough by now to know why this is the best of times. The compromise. The misery. The disintegration. That. I don’t wish to go back and relive that.
For years, when my eyes pried open to meet a life that wasn’t mine, I prayed for this: a chance to discover who I am.
Though, now that I’m living that prayer, what am I making of it? On Tuesday, I snoozed and subsequently sprained my ankle. On Wednesday, while scraping a piece of furniture, I thought to myself, “This is stupid. This sucks.”
Somehow, this became that. Again, even after everything I’ve experienced, I was lulled to sleep by the voice in my head that feels entitled to a life of ease, looking to only ride long, smooth waves groomed by offshore wind. I forgot what it takes.
Yet, forgetting can be good. Here, on a Friday morning, I feel like I’ve emerged from an ice bath for the soul because as Jon Kabat-Zinn writes in Wherever You Go There You Are, “It is in the coming back to mindfulness that seeing lies.”
This week, I saw that I’d strayed off my line. I was missing this wave. So, I made some calibrations, and since, I haven’t snoozed, I haven’t listened to that voice, and I haven’t forgot.
Forgetting is okay as long as we remember.
To livin’ a life we love,
Ryan Fightmaster, MD
