Someone at my office made a comment the other day that really made me reflect. When regrouping after a fairly heated large group meeting of 30+ people that he and I led, he said,
"I view this project - and work here in general - like a rollercoaster. There will be highs where everything goes right and people love what we're doing, and there will be lows where we are struggling, everything's going wrong, and people are firing question after question at us that we can not answer. It's like a rollercoaster, and I choose to go straight through - not get too excited at the highs, not too bothered at the lows. Just keep it all level."
I sat there, kind of nodding in agreement, but in the back of my mind I couldn't help but think....I don't agree with that. I want to ride the entire rollercoaster - I want to feel the highs AND the lows, even when that means dealing with the negative feelings of disappointment or sadness.
You see, there was a point in my life where I didn't want to feel anything. The feelings were just too overwhelming, too much to take on and too much to understand. I wanted that all gone. So I found a way to numb the pain by starving myself - by depriving my body so much of essential nutrition so that my brain didn't function enough to feel properly.
It worked, to a point. I felt numb to most of my emotions and to most of what was going on around me; it was if I was living through life surrounded by a cloud. Instead of feeling all of my emotions, I could only feel one: overwhelming sadness and depression. That was it. Numb out the loneliness, numb out the disappointment, numb out guilt, numb out joy. The focus became "just getting through", and each day I would find myself saying "just make it to the weekend" or "just make it to the end of the semester/end of the year/end of college". I made it through, but I missed out on so much going on around me. So afraid to confront real emotions head on, my life really did turn into a straight line of existence.
When I regained my health and started to feel again, I can't say it was all comfortable or sunshine and rainbows. Things hurt. Feelings hurt. It could be quite painful and mentally exhausting. But with every low and every sadness I felt, I could appreciate a good day that much more. I could feel joy again; I could experience that involuntary smile, that uncontrollable laughter that I thought was gone forever.
Do you ever notice that, after a rainy, snowy, or extremely cold day, the sun seems to shine just a bit brighter the next day? How, in the spring, as we are coming out of the brutal winter season, a 45 degree day is met with welcome arms and shorts - while in the Fall, we bundle up and complain about how cold it is becoming? Those lows - those days that we drudge through, sometimes wondering if we'll make it - that is what gives us perspective. Nothing is innately "good" or "bad" if we have nothing to compare it to. The lowest parts of our life are what make us truly recognize and appreciate the good.
So now? Give me the sad times, give me the lows, if that's what it takes to feel those highs.
I know that the rollercoaster will keep moving, and as much as those drops can nearly destroy you, the highs can drive you over the moon - and that elation is what makes life worth living.
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