Dear Friend

Hello Blog.  It's been a while...

A lot has happened since we talked last.  I suppose this isn't too surprising since I wrote my last post a little less than a year ago. Apologizing seems silly, though--so I've decided I'm not going to. 

Life happens (especially in Boston, it seems...).

So, the meat of this post is actually something I wrote back in October.  I'll get to that.  Here's the backstory: 

At some point this past fall I became inspired by something I read online.  A professional blogger anonymously told the story of a girl who had written to her.  The blogger explained how discouraged this woman was...with herself, with life, with everything.  The woman who wrote to the blogger was essentially contemplating giving up her own life.  After sharing this story online, the blogger strongly urged her readers to offer words of hope and encouragement to the woman in the comments section at the bottom of her post...to provide her with as many reasons as possible to keep on living.

I began reading the comments with hesitance, hoping for the best in terms of the good will of the commenters.  But after a very short amount of time I was brought to tears by the amount of heart that saturated the comments.  Essentially, this had been a plea for this woman's life.  And people had responded with resounding love and compassion through words of comfort, empathy, faith, and support.  They had provided her with reasons to fight for her life.  Reasons why she was an essential part of the puzzle that is this world.  It was raw, emotional, and incredibly touching.  It also left me hoping, with all my might, that these words would become the life rafts that they were intended to be...the life rafts that this woman so desperately needed.   

I added my own comments to blogger's post, but all of it stuck with me.  Additional thoughts and words of encouragement for the woman continued to float around in my mind.  It had definitely resonated with me.  Though I did not know the details of this woman's life, or what had brought her to her feelings of hopelessness, the hills and valleys I had felt in my own life that year definitely made it easy to relate to the woman's feelings of loneliness, saddness, and despair.  But I wasn't quite sure what to do with all of these residual thoughts bursting at the seams to get out...So, I turned to my journal and a pen.  What poured out?  I've decided to share it below.  Most everything (punctuation, capitalization, emphasis, indentation) has been transcribed as is as it was originally written.  The funny thing is, I have found myself coming back to these words on numerous occasions.  They have served as a helpful reminder for me.  My hope is that by sharing them in a public space they can be a helpful reminder for someone else too.

__________                                                                                                            

Dear Friend,

You feel like the world is crashing down on you.

I've been there.

You feel like you are treading water just to stay afloat.

I've been there. Dearest friend,

You feel like everyone around you has their lives together,

While you're still trying to figure out how to put one foot in front of another...

I've been there too.

(There is beauty in imperfection...)

Dear friend...

     You are not alone.

Dear friend...

You are loved.

Dear friend...

You are special, unique, valued, and more than enough.

Don't let anyone tell you otherwise.

Dearest friend...

DANCE!

Dearest friend...

play.   Dear friend,

touch,

feel,

be.

Be aLIVE!!!!!!

Dearest friend...

you are alive...for a reason.

And don't you forget it.

You have dreams.

Don't let them die.

You have hopes.

Don't settle.

You have friends.

Who will always be there for you.  Let them be there for you.

You have family.

Who will love you when the sun rises and will love you when the sun sets.

You have ONE LIFE that may throw a handful of CRAP at you--but you can more than handle it...

You can pick it up and throw it across the room.

You can excel.

You can thrive.

You can weather any storm.

You are somebody! Who matters.

Make it happen. Fly. 

Soar.

Soar higher than anyone ever imagined.

And stare in awe and humbleness at the view below.

You have the potential.

Make it happen.

"Jump so you don't regret standing at the ledge!" 

(Corny? Yes...but who cares??!)

You are strong! So strong.

You can move mountains.

DO IT.

What are you waiting for?

LIVE,

Dearest friend, it's time...

__________