My dearest
readers,
a good friend recently told me about his
new-found determination in life and career and how no one would stop him
anymore, at least not himself. It delighted my to see such finesse, such
awe-inspiring astuteness to defy former aggravating circumstances—and all of that coming from someone of whom I always spoke highly
whenever I saw the audacity and passion he carried along for all of my grad and
most of my undergrad time. Nothing is but what is not…but it must be lifted and
carried!
I often wrote about the way we must walk, or
the path we have to stay on; but what you cannot ignore is the weight you must
carry all along. I wrote about the obstacles we have to overcome, but never
wrote about the burden that is tied onto our backs. And neither did I write
about the load we’ve piled up over the course of our lives, lives that bear
nothing but onerous responsibilities. And in the midst of walking through our
lives we are heavily laden with frustration, anger, rage, disappointment after
disappointment, being shut down and out, being convinced or told one is not
good enough—pick one or two or more, the ones
you tend and are told to carry.
But with our entire burden we are given a
chance to grow. The longer we carry that load, the longer we’re forced to lift
it, the longer we feel the weight of the world, of our worlds, on our shoulders, the stronger we grow over time.
Alexandra Bracken once wrote she were “coming to see the heavier your heart
got, the stronger you had to be to keep carrying it around.” There might be
people around you who are more privileged with a smaller torch to carry, but
the gigantic torch you’ve carried all along, all that time, will at some point
shine brighter than you can fathom, than anyone can fathom. Carry it with pride
and sense of purpose, for then you get to light it and have it shine as
beautiful as a sea of candles floating downstream on a river. Let your load be
your inspiration, your weights on the bar when you’re all fired up to lift like
there is no tomorrow.
It is a tremendous, unimaginable number of tons
we’re dragging along, and there’s no end in sight, for “[w]e are all tied to
the burdens of this existence, and it seems as if everyday renewal is occurring
in our lives and those around us” (Kat Lahr). If you recall the very first post
of #MomentumToGo, you may have felt that it all sags like a heavy load, or does
it explode, that deferred dream, that once-highly-regarded motivation of an
ambitious you, or that fading confidence of a private who first waded his or
her way through basic training only to find out that it was just the beginning
of more things they carried.
It is not only the way, the distance we have to
travel that determines who we are and how we handle it, but it is also the
number of checked bags that must get to the final destination. Can you be
Atlas, the son of invincible spirit, when you board that plane and take your
luggage with you all the way? Welcome aboard, but be aware that in life often
nothing is, but what is not, because this load you’re carrying is life, your
life, and your heavy load. Lift it, carry it, and don’t stop believing that
your time will come, your time to light that Olympic torch of yours and make it
shine for the whole world to see! #DoYouEvenLift
