As a continuous work in progress, I try to remain open to the things about me that I can change in hopes to achieve a more fulfilling and productive life. I find that birds of a feather often flock together. However birds that hang around in one place for too long pick up some hitchhikers along the way.
I'm the bird who loves to fly, I fly with friends, I fly with strangers, I fly alone. I am truly at my best when I am flying. I feel free; free of worry and anxiety, free of fear and free of sadness. I have no need to stress out about anything, all I need to do is take in the beautiful life I have been given. However this bird can't fly forever. I need to stop and refuel, I need to interact with other birds, I need to find birds who want to fly like I fly.
I find a spot to land, I introduce myself to new birds, I spend time with lifelong friends, I share tales of my journey, I listen to the stories of others, and I hear sad stories that touch my heart. Before I know what I am doing, I take the sad birds under my wing, I introduce them to other birds, I take them with me to some of my favorite vantage points. I share my zen-like appreciation for this whole wide world.
The sad birds appear happier, they enjoy the experience, I think that for them it is life changing, and I must be helping them. I can see this because they continue to come back more and more to spend time with me. It feels good to be wanted, needed, loved, accepted. I feel good knowing that I am the one they trust to help them with their sad lives. But each time they return they bring with them another chapter from their original, sad stories. I have become attached to my friends, they have spent some of the most beautiful moments of their lives with me. I have shared some of the most intimate feelings about this great life with them. I am wanting to fix their lives to eliminate the pain, I want to take them in, tape them up and nurse them back to health. Except, I'm no nurse!
Their pain becomes my pain. I want them to experience the great days that we used to have when we first met, I want to see that profound change in their faces their smiles emerging from the deep frown lines in their faces. But that is gone. As they continue to return to their own lives and the sadness that rules them, I am frustrated and hurt, I feel as though I failed them, that I was helping them. The frustration transforms to anger, they chose their shitty life over this world of beauty, they deserve the misery, stupid fucks.
Like awakening from a deep sleep, I realize that days have gone by, weeks, months, I've been busy sulking about losing friends after wasting all that time trying to solve the problems of all of these wounded birds. I've become sluggish, emotionally weighed down. I don't even have the ambition to fly, and my friends are no better off than they day we met. They would rather stay there than move on beyond the sadness. I almost feel helpless, I've begun telling my sad story. Nobody seems to want to hear it. I feel so alone, and I have a small fire burning inside of my head, in the right light, you can see it in my eyes.
There is no need for all this sadness, I pull myself up, I see that I've wasted all of this time and missed out on my life, and all of the great things in it that I enjoy, flying high and soaring above the stressors of life looking down upon them with a new perspective. I'm empowering myself again, I'm giving myself the opportunity to fly, and I am leaving all of the sad birds behind. I've let go of the resentment that I harbored toward them, they have seen a light at the end of their darkness, I have left the door open for them, should they choose to enter, but I am not going to go back and carry them through. When they are ready to end their sadness, they will take flight, until then, I cannot waste anymore of my life trying to bring anyone to a better life. I have hope for all of them, I wish to see them all some other day, on the other side. If I could do it, anyone can.
