Listen...

Just when everything is going well and you couldn't be happier, life throws you a curve ball.

Its funny like that. And the outcome always rests on your inner strength, your ability to "roll with the punches", assess the situation, and find a way to survive it and come out on top. Sometimes it may feel hard to breathe, hard to feel, hard to keep your sanity; hard to believe that you can still be the happiest you've ever been, and this may actually aid in that and make that feeling greater rather than viewing it as a destroyer. And although to some, it may seem like its easier to battle these changes and experiences alone (Lord knows I try this because I don't like to burden others with my troubles, emotional dips and peaks, or to show my vulnerability), there's a sort of salvation, release and a method of self discovering/revealing that comes from confiding, but not transferring, your thoughts, emotions and feelings to someone else. Someone who can hopefully take it and understand that you don't need them to fix things. You don't need them to share your burden's weight or fight your battle or take the punch. You just need them to hold on to you. To validate what you're experiencing. To make you feel real and worth something. 

To listen. 

To believe in the silver lining and believe in you. To accept you as you are. Imperfect. Broken. But still breathing and healing and changing and growing. Just as we all are. 

We walk these streets, side by side, believing we're the only ones going through something like this, feeling this way, that no one could ever possibly know the extent of our inner demons. The shadows that lie in our pasts and haunt our present and taunt our future. But we are not alone. We are not the only ones who battle. And although we may battle different foes, we battle side by side and we are still united in our struggles. We all need a rock. A shoulder. A hand. We all need someone to believe. To believe you can weather this storm, and that you are not standing alone in it. There are those behind you and beside you, to lift you up when you start to fall, to support you and the steps you take. To love you for who you are, who you will be. To find the humanity in your shortcomings and your past transgressions, failures and wounds. 

Someone to listen. To accept. To believe. To love. And all that, combined with your own inner fire, kindled and fed by your desire to live, to succeed, to be happy, to love and be loved; the Soul, the Phoenix that burns with in, is what will get you through and what will set you free. 

What will be will be. The secret is to find the balance between holding on and letting go. And the inner peace that comes from being in that place.