I have believed for many days, weeks, months and now years, that change would be inevitable, given enough time and patience.

But guess what–that is not true.

Seven years ago today the world I’d built so lovingly blew up. My spouse decided it was high time I knew about his secret sexual basement. You know, that place that exists beneath the happy family home that no one knows about except one person–the one who visits there as part of his double life.

Seven years in tibet…no

The seven year itch…no

Lucky number seven…no

Seven years war…not that either.

Seven years in hell–partially.

But only for a season.

It doesn’t matter how wonderful a time in life is, or how awful…it will ease. And there will be shadows and ghosts of it buried deep in mind and body.

Shadows and ghosts.

You can be frightened by the shadows. They can seem to appear from nowhere. You can dread the visitation of the ghosts. OR you can choose to accept their presence knowing they are but reflections of a past gone by. They are there to remind you, to warn you of the brevity of this time on earth. They are there to wear as a badge of courage, survival and thriving, should you choose to do the work of turning your attention toward the present and all the gifts it offers.

I have walked through that long hallway of sorrow, grieving the dreams and realities I’d planned for sweated and wept over. Wisdom hard won.

The wisdom that is earned through pain.

The wisdom that reality dishes up in one portion or another for every human being alive. We all have losses, disappointments, traumas. Some we courted through unwise or naive decisions. Some the result of other people’s actions.

At the end of the day, it is our work to do. Our wisdom to grow. Our choice to live in a way that honors the present circumstances, people, places and things that weave the fabric of our life in the here and now.

I honor my grief.

I honor my losses.

I honor the woman I once was, living naively in the shadow of another’s destructive choices. Even though I felt the chill in that shadow, I honor the loving, giving, benefit of the doubt, positive woman who felt that chill only as a part of life’s challenges to care for, love over and wait patiently for change.

These seven years have taught me without a doubt that I have zero control over anyone’s choices but my own.

I choose me. I choose. I choose everyday to focus on the good, the positive, the wonder, the gifts of this life that have always been a large part of the fabric of my life. I choose to use all those threads of good to reweave the fabric of life to warm me.Those beautiful golden and silver and luminescent threads that held me up even in the darkest days of living in unbenounced deception and lies.

It is my strength, my love, my efforts that have born fruits of resilience and survival to carry me into these good days in the golden years of my life.

These days are good because I choose to see the good, to work for the good, to focus on the good …and be grateful.

So grateful for all the lessons of my ancestors. For the blood in my veins of those people who forged through their own life’s challenges, passing on wisdom of perseverance and integrity. Of holding tight onto the values we hold so dear–of family of humanity and of love.

Love

Everyday

through the meaningful work

Of caring for self and others.

For me, to provided a comfortable place to stay to people from all corners of the world through maintaining an airbnb here under my roof. For caring for my dogs. For painting images of those I love. For walking the safe neighborhood my parents found and bought into in our family home. For access to this amazing tool of the internet to reach people I have not met, but might touch with the care behind my words.

For another day to wonder at the power of nature, the complexity of this amazing world.

Wow.I am blessed.

So are you, should you choose to feed the positive, beauty and love in your world too.