Vernal Equinox
I am humbled to know the stories of how people have adapted to inescapable pain. These stories contain survivorship, courage, grit, and hope. Yes—hope that they survive to see another day, even if they could not imagine a different kind of day yet. I have the utmost respect for the ways they found to move through our too-hard world.
If these words are resonating with you, I hope you take some time today to feel awe and pride in your resourcefulness. You fought for yourself and continue to fight for yourself with fearsome endurance. But I imagine your survivorship has come at a cost. So I also invite you to take a moment to think about the loss here. What parts of yourself did you have to shut down and starve in order to survive? Do you dream any longer? Does tenderness and ease feel accessible or even allowed? Can you wholeheartedly, fearlessly participate in joy? Do you feel angry about the cost? Do you allow yourself to mourn it? It isn’t fair that you paid the cost — you know that.
But what good does it do to even cry about it? Nothing changes. My past doesn’t change, nor does my present. I am who I am and what’s happened has happened.
Do you feel the hardening happen within you as you tell yourself this? You hold your breath, flatten your mouth, ice over your beating heart. It’s painful how we continue the cycle of minimizing our pain. I know it’s how you may have learned to survive heartache, hardships, mothers and fathers who were absent or looming terrifyingly large. But even the longest of nights come to an end. There will be a time — perhaps today—where you can let down your guard. In fact, moving forward necessitates you let it down.
A new season is almost upon us. The spring equinox is coming, and with it, longer days, more sunshine, and more signs of life. I invite you to lean into joy, into frivolity, into ease and into life. I invite you to imagine a different kind of existence for yourself and fight for yourself in a different way. Because your impressive survivorship must have been for something more than merely surviving.
