Hello again, blog...

Hello again blog. It's been a long time, three years to be exact, since we last saw each other. You came across my Facebook memories this morning and I decided to check up on you and see what 29 year old me had written to you in what seems like another life. So much has changed and yet everything remains the same as I read through my thoughts. It was comforting to see that in three years, a speck in the grand scheme of things, my values have remained intact despite feeling as though I've lost myself in the relationships that have come and gone, the hobbies I once had and the now broken plans that I so painstakingly made and changed time and again. Hidden among the ruins, however, I see that I am still here and these ruins are blocks from a once impenetrable prison of self. I am different but not lost. I am changed but not for the worse. Life has a way of taking us on this meandering path of highs and lows, fears and victories and skewing our view of the journey to make it seem as though we haven't chased our dreams or reached our goals. We're cursed with remembering so vividly how we felt when we lost but not how we felt when we conquered. Looking back on a simple piece of writing I realized, I have arrived at my destination so many times. I've made it. I've accomplished it. Time and time again, I've felt the highs we seem to search our whole life for. I firmly believe that people and circumstances are placed in our lives for a purpose. It sounds so cliche but as I look back, I know that every single obstacle, victory, love, inconvenience, disappointment I've ever encountered is priming me for the next and the next. Hidden in the smallest things are the most profound messages about our existence if we just have the courage to look. As I look back over my younger thoughts, I think about what my older self will need, how she may need to read what was written today just as I needed to read what was written so many yesterdays ago. So I leave you with this, dear blog, in the hopes that you'll save it for the day I need it most: Fate has a way of putting in front of us, that which we try most to leave behind. Don't hide your scars or brush off your failures. Stop hiding from the past and trying to escape the reality of your future. You're okay. You've been okay for a long time and nothing that you experience or endure is going to change that you are good and kind and worthy and valuable down to the deepest part of your soul. No matter what changes, you're still the same you and I can't wait to meet you.