10 Years...and Counting

A few short weeks left in 2019.

How is that even possible? Didn’t it just start, like, yesterday?

At first, when someone posted about this on FB, I considered it casually, not allowing more thought than 10 seconds worth of my time. It was later, as I was looking for something around the house that the reality of a whole decade ending came to slap me upside the head, demanding a bit more consideration.

My annoyingly introspective self subsequently began to ask such questions as: what did you do to make these 10 years count? Have you grown on a personal level? Evolved? Have you learned anything or helped anyone?

A sense of discomfort came over me as I began the irritating journey of examination but on the inside. Why not the outside? Well life is funny in many ways as to how unpredictable it tends to be. Of course the overall journey that others can see is no mystery but it’s quite shocking to have to go back a decade, really recall all of them, and try to write them down. I’m not even going to attempt this but here’s a general synopsis:

Losses and gains

Ups and downs

Good and bad

Depressing and jubilant

I think that sums it up pretty aptly and probably, for the most part, apply to most anyone in the world.

There were great strides made in self-discovery, which I think would be the pinnacle of all things that happened. Shedding of ego, becoming humble, letting go of arrogance and a sense that all I think and do is ‘right’. I’ve turned my thinking around but not before facing adversity but that’s why we go through struggles, correct? In a way it’s just a vehicle upon which lessons are delivered to us. I didn’t think so in the past. I actually was sure that everything bad that happened was just a direct and personal vendetta against me, whether it be from God or whatever.

That assumption was lousy full of conceit, now that I think of it. How can it not be? I was so blinded by what was happening to me that there were almost horse blinders in place regarding those around me and what they suffered. Cancer? Not bigger than my mother yelling at me. Someone dying? Yea, well that happened in my family too, so what? A friend suffering from heartache? Oh shut up, been there, done that, no biggie and I can one-up you.

So incredibly narcissistic, really, to believe that I knew all, felt all, suffered all.

But…as this last decade slipped by, we were faced with struggles that were well beyond anything we imagined, bigger than our nucleus and the affects, wide spreading. We received, unto us, an orange dipwad who would change the very landscape of our world. He would bring forth hate, division, overall “isms” that had been lurking in the shadows. I don’t know whether to detest him or thank him because while the universe seems to be so very ugly right now, truth is there is more good than bad, if you look at the individual. However, if we continue live in the warmth of our own ignorance (for that’s so much easier), we are never really faced with the horrid realities that many people face every single day and their struggles. To change, become better, evolve as humanity should, we need to address the societal problems which have been there all along, festering.

I’ll expand upon the above more in a later blog but essentially, after the 2016 elections, I came to grasp just how small my problems really were/are, even though this had been slowly happening throughout the decade; it was just brought into sharper focus as minorities were being marginalized, more so than we could ever imagine.

The afterbirth of the election also brought to my world a varied amount of new people via Facebook. Looking for solace, I eagerly added many like-minded folks who I thought would share my grief and while that is most certainly true, I’ve also learned that regardless of how similar we are and that our political ideologies align, that doesn’t mean we are in lock-step. At first this was disappointing and disheartening but yet again, another lesson. It’s okay to be different, to have varying thoughts, as long as they are not focused on the sole purpose of destroying others for the benefit of themselves. And through these new friends, I saw all sorts of hardship and strife. The grief of losing loved ones, the devastation of being diagnosed with a sickness, the heartache from a dissolution of a relationship…so many stories, so much sadness and sorrow. But through that there was strength and resilience and kindness. There was laughter and lifting one another up and caring. These were things I needed to see.

Yeah, the whole decade was an epic roller coaster that took me from terrible lows to riding high, back down and up again. I suspect this is just a part of life so I shouldn’t expect it to change, and I don’t need it to either. Via these undulations of life,  I’ve become a bit more humble, far less arrogant, less judgmental, giving of myself without expectations of receiving, and overall prepared that if I take the last breath that everyone eventually has to take, it won’t be full of regret.

The next decade (if I can make it through)? I’m going to love a bit more, care a little less what others think, judge only myself, help those who need to be lifted and defend the helpless. I want to make sure that in the next 10, I can somehow get to the end of it and say, I made it all count.