A YEAR OLDER
The human heart beats an average of 72 times a minute, over 100,000 times per day and more than 37 million times per year and for every beat, it is experiencing something- joy, sadness, hurt, worry, pain, pleasure, peace, anger, or love. Every beat is an experience, a knowing, a feeling, a state of being. The heart does not distinguish what it feels; it simply feels what it feels at any given point in time. It is simply experiencing life.
When I was younger, I used to believe that there was dividing line in life which separates all the good days from the bad ones, a line which when crossed, would distinguish all the struggle from the reward, the pain from the pleasure, the hurt from the healing, the shame from the praise, and the sadness from the joy. But there is never a point where life becomes a retirement into a sunset of all good days or joy. Somewhere in our pleasure, we find pain and somewhere in our pain, we find pleasure. The good and the bad do not exist entirely independent of each other, but alongside each other and it is only when we embrace both that we begin to experience what it means to truly live.
It is my birthday, as I reflect on life, I am tempted to classify my journey so far as having been either bad or good. I wish I could say that I have checked a lot of boxes, or that I have smashed a lot of my goals, or even done everything right.
I haven’t.
I cannot say my journey has been all pleasant, nor can I say that it has been unpleasant. But I can simply say it has been beautiful.
I have failed and I have won, cried and laughed. When I look back, I realize that it hasn’t been made up of all bright colors but a whole mix of dark, green, red, grey, white and everything else in-between.
On some days, I get so carried away by the thought of arriving at my destination that I forget the destination is often short-lived and the journey is where all the magic happens. I forget to relax and enjoy every bit of it…to savor every fragrance of joy, to breathe in every atom of love and to embrace the discomfort that is simply a part of life.
As I mark another year, I hope to smash a lot more goals, attain more heights and check more boxes, but more importantly, I hope to always remember to simply live, to enjoy the miracle of every breath, to cherish the sight of every beauty, to feel the magic of every touch… to simply live life before it ends because some day, it will.
