The most beautiful people we have known are those who have known defeat, known suffering, known struggle, known loss, and have found their way out of those depths.
Elisabeth Kubler-Ross
Struggle can make us feel like a piñata at a 10 year old’s birthday party. Defeat can shove our faces in the dirt and kick us while we’re down. Loss can crack and shatter us.
But they don’t have to define us.
Hurt feelings and miscommunications are going to happen when the struggle gets real. We’re human and humans are imperfect creatures. But we don’t have to let the fall be the end of the story. We can choose to get back up, wipe off the dirt, and pick up the pieces.
Struggles hit harder when love is there, because love is this mysterious thing that simultaneously breaks us open and holds us together. Love can also give us a laser-like focus on minutiae, which makes it even more important to remember to zoom our internal camera out and look at the big picture from a wider angle. The more concentrated the point of view, the more intense things feel.
When the struggle gets real, take a breath, zoom out, and never forget that I love you.
Love,
