A TIME COMES:
 
 A time comes in your life when you finally get it...
 When in the midst of all your fears and insanity you
 stop dead in your
 tracks and somewhere the voice inside your head
 cries out  -  ENOUGH!

Enough
 fighting and crying or struggling to hold on.  And,
 like a child quieting
 down after a blind tantrum, your sobs begin to
 subside, you shudder once or
 twice, you blink back your tears and through a
 mantle of wet lashes you begin
 to look at the world through new eyes. 

This is your
 awakening.  You realize
 that it's time to stop hoping and waiting for
 something to change or for
 happiness, safety and security to come galloping
 over the next horizon.
 You come to terms with the fact that he is not
 Prince Charming and you are
 not Cinderella and that in the real world there
 aren't always fairytale
 endings (or beginnings for that matter) and that any
 guarantee of "happily
 ever-after"  must begin with you and in the process
 a sense of serenity is
 born of acceptance.
 You awaken to the fact that you are not perfect and
 that not everyone
 will always love, appreciate or approve of who or
 what you are...and that's
 OK. (They are entitled to their own views and
 opinions.)  And you learn the 
 importance of loving and championing yourself and in
 the process a sense of
 new found confidence is born of self-approval.
 
 You stop complaining and blaming other people for the
 things that they did
 to you (or didn't do for you) and you learn that the
 only thing you can
 really count on is the unexpected.  You learn that
 people don't always say
 what they mean or mean what they say and that not
 everyone will always be
 there for you and that it's not always about you.
 So, you learn to stand on
 your own and to take care of yourself and in the
 process a sense of safety &
 security is born of self-reliance.

 You stop judging and pointing fingers and you begin
 to accept people as they
 are and to overlook their shortcomings and human
 frailties and in the
 process a sense of peace & contentment is born of
 forgiveness.  You realize
 that much of the way you view yourself, and the
 world around you, is as a
 result of all the messages and opinions that have
 been ingrained into your
 psyche.  And you begin to shift through all the junk
 you've been fed about
 .....how you should behave, how you should look and
 how much you should weigh
 what you should wear and where you should shop and
 what you should
 drive...how and where you should live and what you
 should do for a living...
 who you should date, who
 you should marry and what
 you should expect of a marriage, the importance of
 having and raising
 children or what you owe your parents.
 
 You learn to open up to new worlds and different
 points of view.  And
 you begin reassessing and redefining who you are
 what you really stand for. 
 You learn the difference between wanting and needing
 and you begin to discard
 the doctrines and values you've outgrown, or should
 never have bought in to
 begin with and in the process you learn to go with
 your instincts.  You learn
 that it is truly in giving that we receive.  And
 that there is power and
 glory in creating and contributing and you stop
 maneuvering through
 life merely as a "consumer"  looking for your next
 fix.

 You learn that principles such as honesty and
 integrity are not the
 outdated ideals of a by gone era but the mortar that
 holds together the
 foundation upon which you must build a life.  You
 learn that you don't know
 everything, it's not your job to save the world  and
 that you can't teach a
 pig to sing.  You learn to distinguish between guilt
 and responsibility and
 the importance of setting boundaries and learning to
 say NO.   You learn that
 the only cross to bear is the one you choose to
 carry and that martyrs get
 burned at the stake. 

Then you learn about love.
 Romantic love and
 familial love.  How to love, how much to give in
 love, when to stop giving
 and when to walk away.  You learn not to project
 your needs or feelings onto
 a relationship.  You learn that you will not be,
 more beautiful, more
 intelligent, more loveable or important because of
 the man on your arm or the
 child that bears your name.  You learn to look at
 relationships as they
 really are and not as you would have them be.  You
 stop trying to control
 people,
 situations and outcomes.  You learn that just as
 people grow and change so it
 is with love....and you learn that you don't have
 the right to demand love on
 your terms...just to make you happy.
 And, you learn that alone does not mean lonely...

 And you look in the
 mirror and come to terms with the fact that you will
 never be a size 5 or a
 perfect 10 and you stop trying to compete with the
 image inside your head and
 agonizing over how you "stack up."
 You also stop working so hard at putting your
 feelings aside, smoothing
 things over and ignoring your needs.  You learn that
 feelings of entitlement
 are perfectly OK...and that it is your right to want
 things and to ask for
 the things that you want...and that sometimes it is
 necessary to make
 demands.   You come to the realization that you
 deserve to be treated with
 love, kindness, sensitivity and respect and you
 won't settle for less 

You begin eating a
 balanced diet, drinking more
 water and taking more time to exercise.  You learn
 that fatigue diminishes
 the spirit and can create doubt and fear.  So you
 take more time to rest.
 And, just as food fuels the body, laughter fuels the
 soul.  So take more time
 to laugh and to play.
 
 You learn, that for the most part, in life you get
 what you believe you
 deserve...and that much of life truly is a
 self-fulfilling prophecy.  You
 learn that anything worth achieving is worth working
 for and that wishing for
 something to happen is different from working toward
 making it happen. More
 importantly, you learn that in order to achieve
 success you need direction,
 discipline and perseverance.  You also learn that no
 one can do it all alone
 and that it's OK to risk asking for help.
 
 You learn that the only thing you must truly fear is
 the great robber
 baron of all time.  FEAR itself.  You learn to step
 right into and through
 your fears because you know that whatever happens
 you can handle it and to
 give in to fear is to give away the right to live
 life on your terms.  And
 you learn to fight for your life and not to squander
 it living under a cloud
 of impending doom.  You learn that life isn't always
 fair, you don't always
 get what you think you deserve and that sometimes
 bad things happen to
 unsuspecting, good people.  On these occasions you
 learn not to personalize
 things. 

You learn that God isn't punishing you or
 failing to answer your
 prayers.  It's just life happening.  And you learn
 to deal with evil in its
 most primal state - the ego.  You learn that
 negative feelings such as anger,
 envy  and resentment must be understood and
 redirected or they will suffocate
 the life out of you and poison the universe that
 surrounds you.  You
 learn to admit when you are wrong and to building
 bridges instead of walls
 
 You learn to be thankful and to take comfort in many
 of the simple
 things we take for granted, things that millions of
 people upon the earth can
 only dream about; a full refrigerator, clean running
 water, a soft warm bed,
 a long hot shower. Slowly, you begin to take
 responsibility for yourself by
 yourself and you make yourself a promise to never
 betray yourself and to
 never ever settle for less than your heart's desire.
 And you hang a wind chime outside your window so you
 can listen to the wind.

 And you make it a point to keep smiling, to keep
 trusting, and to stay open
 to every wonderful possibility.
 
 Finally, with courage in your heart you take a
 stand, you take a deep
 breath and you begin to design the life you want to
 live as best as you can.

Author unknown

 

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since 13/15/02