When You Can't Make It All Better

Thick fog
Deep darkness
No words
Still standing.

If you're like me, you've had a time in your life when you have worked and worked and worked, and tried and tried and tried to make a friendship or relationship last. At one time it may have been a source of joy or bliss or assurance, but then the time arrives when it is more like a beaten-down automobile that you have to take into the shop more and more frequently. It's hard to give up on that car because you have emotional ties to it; that road trip, doing donuts in the shopping mall parking lot, the vacation to the Grand Canyon.

But then one day you finally realize.

You can't make it all better. It's time to give up.

You feel like a cardinal with a broken wing, or a retriever missing a leg. You've been a fixer, a doer, so this feels unnatural and unbearable. Still something inside says "Hold on, a new way of life is beginning for you."

You must hold on to such words, for they are words of life, and they will get you through.

"It's time to stop trying."

"It's OK to let go."

"You don't have to be the strong one anymore."

"You aren't a failure."

"You aren't a failure!"

You have felt like the trapeze artist, trying to make sure that each step is carefully calculated.

Now it's time to trust the catcher.

Mark Andrew Alward