I find it quite impossible to put into words, just how floored I am by the strength of many of the people (particurly women, there, I said it!) I am blessed to know.  They keep going through all manner of personal and professional struggles, melee, and storm.

 

And I’m genuinely bothered when I think that somewhere, when most of us were small, (particularly girls I would argue) some indoctrination left many of us with a notion that we could and should let some big strong force outside ourselves; perhaps a rich, healthy good looking stranger with powerful connections, or a fairy god-person, arrive and rescue us from our toil.

 

Guess what.  That fine cup of hubba hubba with a trust fund is struggling through their own battles.  They are all kinds of broken just like anyone else.  Oh, and the fairy god person’s only actual power is spitting back the magic and strength you’ve already got locked in you.

 

The only person who is ever actually going to get you both into, and out of, any bind you find yourself in, is you.

 

I’m not saying to suck it up buttercup, because my stars I know from personal experience and watching struggles from the sidelines and cheering sections of so many lives, that sometimes things are just a stone-cold struggle.

 

You did not earn, nor do you deserve all the grief or challenge you are handed.  Sometimes, the best and kindest people on this earth are handed a cup of cold sick to swallow.  In other (seemingly all too frequent) instances truly cruel and callous cauldron’s of evil seem to go from strength to strength by ignoring the basic rules of human kindness and preying on people for their own gain.  It sucks.  It is not fair.  And you are not alone no matter how lonely and fed up you might be feeling.

 

I mention in nearly every blog that each person is fighting their own battles, most of the time we know nothing about.  No matter how put upon or cruel you feel you’re being treated, it so often stems from something and the only way through is kindness and Love.  When roadblocks are being built along a path, even if the person or entity doing the building or digging is clearly making things harder for you, just think about the architect of the difficulties.  Stop, and think to yourself as you pity the destructive force making you scramble, who hurt them?  Most (maybe even all, bar psychopaths) people are doing the best they can, and only seek to hurt or destroy in a futile effort to quiet the echoes or screams of things that hurt and destroyed them.  They are not the hero in your narrative, you are, and no hero in real or imagined history, has ever done anything worthwhile without facing down a few villains.

 

Your time to shine is quite often going to be served to you when you’re quite decidedly through with shining, and in the greatest need of a rest.  This said, I sincerely urge you to keep going and be patient and hopeful because life is actually tough and full of stuff.  And sadly, any heroics in this life are only possible when things are falling apart around a hero’s ears.  There will be times that are rich and terrifying with darkness. There will also be times of blinding light.  Lights often require some sort of fight to switch on I have found. The only way to clock challenges laid in your path, is to be your own hero, and simply keep going.

 

There’s no silver lining without a cloud, and there is no fix to life being confusing or painful at times.  What there is, and always has been, is time.  It also doesn’t seem reasonable to suggest that time will fix the truly life altering difficulties or grief that is dealt to you. Time won’t patch up the potholes or pain along your path, but time will reward you with wisdom, joy and new chances to be and feel magic.  A hero like you must keep true to instincts and your own truth, no matter how bumpy, dark and terrifying it may get sometimes.

 

I think, if you are still with me, and reading this, you may be thinking about the things that are threatening to break you today, or have seemed menacing or unimaginable in the past.  Chances are, I do not, nor does anyone else, truly grasp the magnitude of the  mountains you’ve moved.  Nobody but you knows what you have had to let go or cling onto as you scaled cliffs and conquered rocks.  What I definitely do know, is that you are here now, reading my characteristically cathartic ramblings.  And I know that you’ve almost certainly been through the dark and the sun has broken for you before, and it will again.  The cycle will continue inexhaustibly for the rest of your (and everyone else’s) time on this planet.

 

Sadly, no matter how vehemently you try to control or understand the world around us, you’ll only ever have the power to write your own narrative, and be the hero in your own story.

 

If you stop and think of every truly remarkable person through history, and probably all those you know as the bastions of hope and kindness in your own life, you may actually see that they’ve been through some heavy stuff. You may also see that l it is the battles that are the hardest fought that yield the sweetest tasting victory.  Having things handed too easily to us can often end up in hollow or empty victory, decidedly uncool to celebrate. 

You may already know, Lottery winners (over 70% according to my scouring of the Internet), regardless of the size of their winnings, end up in a worse financial state than they were before their statistically improbable win. I’d also challenge you to find many people who have peaked in their career, life, family or any pursuit, who just sit back and stop striving, struggling and questioning their position and existence most of the time.

 

So, I urge you to find your dream team, your tribe, or your motley crew and practice your heroic deeds together.  Stay true to the lessons and moral compass you’re carrying with every scene, chapter, and plot twist.  Think back on all the times you’ve kept going, and how good it felt when you did.  You’ll go farther faster if you fortify your fight with other heroes trying to switch lights on and not extinguish them.

 

And there’s going to be plot twists.

 

And things are going to be too much at times.

 

But it is up to you to be the hero that you wish would be a hero to you.  And yes, cheesy as it may sound, resilience may prove that you were the hero you needed the whole time.

 

Good luck on whatever your quest might be.