60 Weeks of Gratitude - Week 8
The Sequoia tree does not have sap in its bark. This means that when fires come and they get burned, they aren't consumed. They can heal. They grow new wood to cover the scars. The evidence can be seen in their rings. I learned that while doing a walking meditation (thank you Down Dog). It stayed with me all week, that thought that a tree can scar over and heal from fire damage. We are like that. We heal. We grow. We survive.
I saw a post on social media this week asking the question: If you could go back to the age of 6 with all the knowledge you have, would you? There was something about $10,000,000.00 if you didn’t but that intrigued me less.
Would I go back to being six years old and relive my life? There are a million things I would have done differently. I would have tried out for the cheerleading team in junior high instead of sitting out, too self-conscious and intimidated as the other girls tried. I had dreamed of being on the cheer squad since I was about six and my insecurity and lack of self-confidence blew that one to shreds in one afternoon. That one decision, maybe the first decision I ever actually made about myself, set the trajectory of my school days.
Had I made the team, it would have changed my social network. I would have made entirely different connections and mistakes. I would have been invited to parties and I would have had after-school activities, which means I wouldn’t have been sitting in my room making up stories. I probably wouldn’t have had the friend who asked me to go to an audition for the play Nevertheless by David Radavich, which led me to several years of involvement with the theatre. I probably wouldn’t have gone to California because I wouldn’t have thought I had the makings of an actress. I wouldn’t have found that I was comfortable and confident on stage, pretending to be other people. Which means I wouldn’t have made any of those California choices and mistakes. I wouldn’t have returned to Illinois like a wounded pup, I wouldn’t have met and dated the person I dated next and we wouldn’t have moved to St Louis, which was a miserable place for me to live. I might still have come home to my parents’ house after my grandmother died to help my mother through the probate, so my husband and I may have found each other the way we did. But would I have been the person that fits with him had I lived a different series of misadventures? Would I find myself here today if I didn’t live the life I have lived? Would I be somebody else entirely?
If given the choice, I would have to choose not to go back. I am not proud of everything I have done in my life. I have hurt people and been hurt. I have dropped the ball on relationships, friendships, and family. We all have. But on balance, I think I have been a decent person and I am proud of who I have become. People are resilient, like the sequoia tree, we heal over and become tougher, and most of us try not to make those same mistakes again.
This week, I am grateful for being like a sequoia tree.
February Promotions:
Through Bookfunnel, check out a great collection of suspense/thrillers, free download.
Off Dark Ledge is included.
Through Bookfunnel, check out a collection of Audiobooks with sales links.
Hush, Delilah, Narrated by Suzie Althens is included.
I also participated in the Facebook Group, Bookish Road Trip's Groundhog Day Giveaway. I chose 4 winners.
Comments