This Too Shall Pass

Life's roller coaster never stops. It's always either on the way up, or on the way down. It's never stagnant...always in motion. This is good. And this is bad. When you're feeling happy, content, joyful, safe, loved, secure...cherish it. Revel in it. Soak it up. Be in the moment. Engrain it. Because, chances are...no, guaranteed, it won't last. When you're feeling down, scared, lonely, defeated, discontented, hopeless...take heart, because this too shall pass.
I've been in both places. I felt the elation of being at the peak of the roller coaster, and I enjoyed that addicting high. And I've endured the fall, on more than one occassion, reaching the lowest point on that never-ending ride. What I've learned is that I can always make it up again...even from depths that I thought I'd never climb out of. I did. I'm strong. I'm resilient. I'm an Army of one.
I've relied on my family and friends....to help me through my hard times, and to celebrate the happy ones. But, somehow, it has just hit me that there is only one person in life that you can count on one hundred percent of the time. There is one person who will always be there with you and for you, through thick and thin, no matter what. There's one person who's eyes you can look into for answers, who will always tell you the truth, tell you what you need to know, and can communicate that information without uttering a single word. There's one person who knows you better than everyone else...knows your fears, your strengths, your hopes, your secrets.
Oftentimes, we credit others for our accomplishments, our achievements...as if this other person enabled us to be who we are, to achieve what we've done...we think this person completes us, makes us better, makes us "whole". No. We may want that to be the case, because we love to romanticize. As a self-proclaimed drama queen, I LOVE to romanticize, fantasize, dramatize. But, at the end of the day, and in the middle of the night, when we each lay our own head on our own pillow...we are who we are...to our own credit. When people who we've chosen to extol inevitably exit our lives...our strengths remain, often even stronger...our beauty radiates, usually more intensely, our achievements are our own...because they would have been realized with or without that person who we foolishly credited. And we continue along our individual roller coaster rides, reveling in the ups and enduring the downs. As I lay my head on my pillow tonight, I'll take comfort in knowing that the person who gives me the strength, the grace, the fortitude, the determination, the spirit, the guts, and the heart to always rise again, to perservere, to face adversity and continually find my smile, will be looking into my eyes in the morning. Always.