Moments

There are moments in time that are pivotal, that change you, that harden you, that open you, that break you down, that build you up, that change your whole way of thinking. Sometimes they happen in a classroom, or on a basketball court, in your childhood home, or in an empty parking lot late at night. Many of these moments you are later grateful for happening. Often times, while they are happening, they are painful and you aren't sure you can handle the pain they cause during the process. While occasionally they can be happy moments, often the ones that really shape you are the ones that caused the most pain. While it is sad to think that,  unfortunately, it is often the reality of it. The things that don't kill us make us stronger. However, while we grow stronger, we also have a tendency to grow more cynical and hardened. When we harden ourselves against the elements, we close ourselves off from the potential good around us. We close ourselves off from the possibility of love, of friends, of exploration, and new adventures. We close ourselves off from seeing the best in ourselves, because too often we see ourselves through the negative eyes of those who caused the pain. Pain is needed for growth. Love is needed to keep our humanity. Humility is needed to keep our kindness.
Those moments, when they happen, you have to decide how to move forward. Do you cut those people who caused it from your life, or do you turn the other cheek time and again to allow them  to continue the damage, and the growth process. When is enough enough? When do you finally call it what it is? A time to move on, a time to grow while leaving them behind. The time to make the decision is also dependent upon the situation. A lesson learned on the basketball court by a coach who is trying to teach you to be better and grow as a player can be painful for the strain on the muscles, or humiliating in front of teammates as the mistake is made apparent to all, but the player will show respect, apply the skill, and later thank the coach for all they do. A love who has damaged a heart, that is a lot harder. Often the damage is too irrepairable to appreciate the lesson learned and allow the forgiveness and show of respect, and often they walk away from each other rather than learn and grow in that love. A moment when one is left alone, crying on a darkened parking lot from the over abundance of stress, and there is no one there to lend a shoulder, teaches you, you truly are alone, it is only you against the world, there is no one else who will ever be there. In this case, the walls of solitude are strengthened, the heart is hardened a little more and the tears drown the humility and kindness and love on the inside until you are a cold shell of what you once were.
Unfortunately, the negative moments in life, the ones where you feel less than who you are, those are the moments that seem so much easier to trust in and believe than the good moments, the moments that try to tell you that you are loved, that you are good enough, that you are worth something.
Why is it that the bad things are so much easier to believe than the good? Why is it that negative attitudes are so much more infectious than a positive attitude? Why is people are more inclined to share a negative experience than a positive one? Why are people more likely to tear one another down rather than build each other up? Why can't we embrace and love each other as we are, rejoice in our differences, be happy for each others successes rather than be bitter and jealous for what we don't have?
I want to surround myself with people who don't have to watch my every move, who believe that I am an honest person. Who want to tell me the good things about myself not the negative. I want to be around people who understand I am a person who loves to build others up, who loves to celebrate in others small victories in life, whose heart bleeds when you are in pain. I love my friends, my family, and even my enemies. I want to be the person to turn the other cheek. But I also what to be the person who learns how to walk away from a toxic situation, not because I don't care, but because I am more important than the toxic situation. And because I am smart enough to learn I can't change that person and it will be easier to love from a far.
My heart is huge, and I feel way too much of what is going on in others around me.

Moments, they exist. They are real. They build us, they break us, they make us grow. Everyone needs a shoulder sometimes. Now is my time for a shoulder and I haven't one to lean on, to cry on, to hold me. I miss having shoulders to be there when I need them. I am not one to admit when I need a someone, and I am not only admitting, I am crying outloud, begging for someone, anyone, to be there, to be my shoulder, to be my person, and yet I am yelling in to an empty oasis, the yells and screams they echo and come back, bouncing back from the broken jagged darkness that surrounds me. My heart is bleeding, my eyes won't stop crying, my hands tremble, my knees are weakened, and my feet will no longer move one in front of the other, I need a crutch, I need a shoulder and I have only myself, and that pain, that pain, that realization, that is enough to put all my walls back in place, to harden my heart and keep everyone once again at arms length. I am tired, and I am weak, and I am don't want to keep going.

Help! Can anyone hear me out there? Help! Help me! (as I fall to my knees in sobs shaking my shoulders and my back curls around my knees - my sobs become silent as the tears stream down my face and my small ineffectual fists pound the soundless ground) I realize I am alone and the darkness weighs down on me. I don't want to open my eyes again. I want to go to sleep and remain there, my eyes to never see light again, for my heart and my body to not feel pain again. For my lungs to not burn with the cold winter air, nor my body to burn due to the over exposure to sunlight during the summer, I think I'd rather not feel these again. I think I would rather sleep the sleep of 100 years or more.

My sons arms around my neck as he hugs me goodnight or my sweet snuggle bug cuddling with me in the early morning hours, those are the very few things I'll miss, but are they enough?

Help!!! Help me!! Tell me I am not alone. Tell me I have a shoulder! Hold me tight like you plan to never let me go. Help!! (My sobs become even more inconsolable as I am still here alone.) Where has everyone who claims to love me disappeared? Where are those who claim to care? I need someone....anyone...HELP! the tears are enough to fill glasses, I can't catch my breath through the sobs. Why? Why am I alone? HELP!

These are the moments, these are the moments that shape who we are, that forge our future and dictate where we go. Moments, they are good and bad, they happen sometimes in the least likely places, but the moments, however small or large, however old or new, it only takes one small moment to change the course you are on. "two roads converged ...in a road.....and I took the one less traveled...."

written 11/9/15