There are moments of my life that repeat over and over in my head, things I don’t necessarily understand the significance of them until later. Things I have had that inspired me, mistakes I’ve made, and conversations I have had with others.  One of these is a silly question I came across when I was shooting theoretical questions back and forth. The question had more of one of the feel of an online personally quiz then an introspective plot point in my life. The question from years ago was “If I were to embody an element in my life, which would it be?”. A simple question really in the grand scheme of things, but at the time I chose the wind, something that can flows through life touching everything but never being captured, something that bends and flows around problems but is a force that can erode great structures and even become the power behind a storm.  My friend had disagreed with me, never seeing me as the wind but instead light. I didn’t at the time understand the full extension of that statement. Light like wind, can’t be captured or contain, it illuminates and guides, creating a path, always the first thing that enters a room, allowing all those who follows to know the path they can follow and to demystify the world.  I had to wrap my head around it, I didn’t feel worth of such a designation. Light for me was just much to bright, how could I be light when I struggle and fall, when I crash and crawl, when a lot of the time I don’t know really what I am doing.  I have just been trying to live in the best way for me, how could I illuminate anyones path for anyone.

It is easy to look at the bright side of light(unintentional pun), but with everything comes pro’s and con’s. I became scared of being light, something when too focused on people or things begins to burn them, something the reveals the things in people that they don’t want to see (including things within myself), something that cast shadows and hurts to see directly. Now you already know that I have over thought this way too much. It’s a simple statement that I shouldn’t necessarily put all that much stock into. I never planned to put that much thought into it but it became this small and growing obsession over whether or not it was true, and  if should I try to live up to “light”.  It would mean to expose myself in light and come to terms with all that is to be me.

I got my answer though, and it’s through this last couple months.  From suffering from the darkness in my own life, revealing the faults and fractures from within myself that I came to a clarity of where I realized what I want to be. I realized by coming back home that the world has people are struggling just as much as I am, with people losing hope of a way out of the crushing defeat of the soul. When the day becomes long and we had to think about how hard it is sometimes to get out of bed and losing the reason to do so. Losing the color and vibrancy of the world around us, seeing everything in a smattering of grey, so much so that things we love simple become actions and fade into nothing. When dreams start to feel out of reach or simply not worth reaching for. Worst of all losing the smile that we all have deep down inside that itself is an illumination of the soul within. I know the horrors of this darkness, the well of emotion what we sit in unable to seemingly reach or climb our way out of, only destined to look up at the freedom we don’t have. What I want to be for others is the morning sun, the one that comes out after the darkness of night to warm all those who were stuck out in the cold. The warm light that touches the skin and brings reprieve knowing that the day will come. Inside of me, I feel that desire to spread that warm love and light I know and have found within myself to reignite the light in any of those trapped in that darkness, show us the way home after a long night of wandering. To reignite the sparkle in our eyes, and the love in our hearts. To show the everyone, how beautiful the world can be and that there is hope and happiness out there for us all.

Lastly just wanted to say that there is a path out there, people who care, and light at the end of the tunnel.  If anyone wants to talk, I will listen, no judgement.

Today I wanted to start with one of my favorite quotes by Mark Twain:

“History doesn’t repeat itself, but it does rhyme.”

It brings me back to thinking about how one of my favorite teachers talked about the cycles and circles that civilizations travel,  becoming more modern and more “civilized” only to fall back into the same trend as before. Seemingly following an inescapable track which spirals upwards in history. A ring for which we all must travel through the course of our lives.

Recently I have been feeling as if my life as been going in a strange circle, a loop for which there is no end. Though it’s not the same place in which I started, its similar. Not the same conversation, but close. Finding myself in situations in which I thought I had just gotten out of.  Some of the circles are good ones, eating right, exercising, talking with friends but not all are positive. Coming face to face with things over and over, choosing similar answers to the situation only to bring me back to the same place a little while later. It’s the power of habit and comfort controlling my life. This track in which I have grown accustom but at the same time somewhat despise because nothing changes. The same choices and no changes.

The only way to break free of this track in which I am riding is to choose a different road. Go on a different path, one I have never gone on before. For me its hard to stray from this place I have become so accustomed, in which I have this illusion of control. I just can’t keep doing the same thing over and over again and expecting for me to get further on my journey. These are chaotic rings that allow me to choose over and over again a different path, allow me to change my life at any moment of it, but make the path always look less promising that what I know. That is the curse of the other path, it’s not a guarantee nor do I know where it leads. On the road in which to improve myself the only thing to do is to learn from my mistakes and take the other path hoping I find a better track to ride, I at least have the power to choose which cycle in which I want to become accustom.

Counting recently, I realized I have been through the school application process 4 times in my life. For high school, college from high school, college from community college, and now with grad school.  About a week ago I interview for graduate school and i got this familiar feeling in my chest. A feeling that I had gotten when I went to orientation for the first time I went to college.

My girlfriend at the time commented that even though I had gone to Italy for three weeks, the 3 days I was gone were much emotional. I am starting to understand why. When I am on a trip, I have a home to come back to, a home which greets me with familiar friends, family, and places. It’s a permanent place, so regardless of where I go, I can count on it being there when I get back. Thats why going on the trip this summer didn’t impact me as much. Going for that interview though, realizing that home will now be someplace unfamiliar made me fear the future.  My parents both came from different parts of the country for different reason, picking up from where the familiar was to find a new and better place for themselves. When talking to my mother about it, she gave me some insight, when she left, she hated the place she was and needed to get out. I on the other hand, don’t have a problem with where I live, I actually like it so it makes it hard to think I could leave.

I didn’t realized there were these lines that were connected to me.  I always thought I was free of them and of the sentimental goings on of those who were attached to a place. Turns my mind may be free but I am bound secretly to the things around me.

Home will always be a fond memory, the people around me that I owe so much will always be in my heart, and the lessons I have learned are in my mind. So wherever I am, I know at least have already packed the important things.

Back in high school I ran all the time in the evenings. It was the only time I had, so by the time eight or nine a clock came around I laced up my shoes and headed out the door. I knew the route I would take by heart so I never thought about it, I just followed my feet. The cold night air and a stillness of the night always made the run enjoyable. It was always me against the concrete that I ran on, but after a while of running I go used to it, I got better at it so I needed to find a new target.  A goal which I can improve myself on and push me to keeping going faster and further than before. The problem was that I always ran alone… the next best solution used the streetlights as my guide. It illuminated my shadow in front of me as I went along the path so I decided to chase my shadow. The intangible reflexion of myself, that always was a few feet in front of me no matter how hard I pushed myself. It became what I wanted to be, my ideal, always reaching toward but never being able to accomplish.

As any child, I chase my parents shadows, seeing their lives as they have them, forgetting the years of hardship and experience they gained to get there. I am at a weird time where I am trying to figure out what I want in life, but only seeing the end result, never the journey and the cost of things. I have been chasing shadows my whole life, running after things and people for what I thing could be instead of what they are.  Shadows that are seemingly huge only to realize its actually small, simple steps to get there. It’s hard to chase shadows, it doesn’t show you the way, it doesn’t  show you what it took to get there, all it is a representation of what could be when you cast light on it.  Its ironic in a way that what creates shadows is what destroy them. I can’t catch a shadow, because it was never there in the first place.

I don’t want to chase shadows, especially of those who are around anymore. I want to see the people behind the shadow, illuminating the path I have to take for myself.