Life is hard, you know? Like, it’s always something, it’s always one more thing, it’s always one more issue. Life just keeps happening. And no matter how hard we work to slow it down, it never does. It never comes back to our pace. We get caught up in the drama of it all and we forget who we are and who we were. There is such a disconnect between the person I was in high school and the person I am now. There is this girl who wants the world. And then, there is this girl who realizes she’s 41 and should just be happy she can pay her mortgage. We all make sacrifices. The broken promises. The forgotten dreams. The hurt. We focus on the now and our wants and we forget that there is actually a lot of beauty around us. There is a lot of love around us. I think sometimes we just choose to ignore it because we’d rather feel sorry for ourselves. We’d rather marinate in the bad and the never was or never will be. I do that. I do that a lot. I find myself lost in daydreams, thinking about a future that won’t be, hoping for a love that is never going to be, and I lose sight of the path in front of me. I struggle because I have a good life. I have a life of plenty. I travel. I have adventures. I have friends. But somedays I forget that. Somedays I focus on what I don’t have, on what I don’t know. Somedays it’s harder than others to let this doubt go. Somedays it’s really hard for me to move on. Somedays I find myself fighting tooth and nail for something I want, only to always come up wanting. Some days, I just say to hell with it, and move on. Tonight, I don’t know where I am. I find myself somewhere between hope and f$%* it. I find myself trying and trying and trying and every time I try this little voice is telling me “just stop”, “let it go”, “move on”, “they don’t care”. I think we all find ourselves there most days. I think we all tend to spend our lives walking that line, teetering on that boundary of what is and what could be. Uncertain. Certain. Hopeful. Hopeless. Hoping.

The bottom line is this. Nothing ever works out how you had it planned. Nothing is ever going to be how you imagined it. There is no Prince Charming (sorry guys… and girls). Everyone disappoints you. There is no pre-packaged happily ever after. Everything is work. Work is work. Life is work. Relationships are work. Love is work. People are work. Getting up in the morning is work. Going to bed at night is work. And you don’t always get out of it what you put into it. That’s the BIG lie I think. Someone always says, “just work harder, just give more…” but sometimes you give everything to someone and they let you down. Sometimes you love unconditionally and find yourself alone because the other person has conditions. Sometimes you find yourself in love with a coward. Sometimes you find yourself in love with a person who is just cruel because they can be. Sometimes you find yourself in love with a person who just doesn’t know what they want or who they want. Sometimes you just pick the wrong person to love. I mean hell, sometimes you work 18 hour days when no one else does and still get fired. Sometimes shit just happens. There isn’t a rhyme or reason to this. There isn’t an answer. I think we as humans need an answer, why have to know why. I ask all the time, but sometimes I just don’t get an answer, so do I keep asking or do I let go? I never know. Do I fight or do I concede? I always find myself fighting and I always find myself wishing I had just flown the white flag. I am so tired of fighting for lost causes. I am so tired of fighting for things that just break my heart. And yet, I never stop fighting and I hate myself for that. I will let a person tear me down time and time again and I will keep coming back for more. I think we all do this. I think this is the basis of human nature.

When I was in the 2nd grade I read a book on Sally Ride, I decided I wanted to be an astronaut. When I was in the 4th grade the Challenger blew up and when I was in high school my math teacher told me “some people just can’t do math”. So I quit that dream. If you read my high school yearbook I said I was going to be a news anchor on NBC. When I started college as a communication major my mentor and professor Dr. Feliciti looked around the room and said “most of you won’t make it in tv. You have faces for radio.” So I quit that dream. If there was ever face for radio, it was mine. I had 11 majors in college. I didn’t know what I wanted to be when I grew up. I’m still not sure I know I want to be when I grow up. I’m ok with that. I’ve learned to be alright with that. Eventually, I’ll figure my shit out. Eventually we’ll all figure our shit out.

Bad shit happens. Some of us turn to God, some of us turn to friends, some of us become depressed, some of us write, some of us cry and rage against the world. I mean a bug just flew up nose as I type this. I could ask why or I could just blow it out and go about my day. Ok, I can’t move on. It’s really up there. Oh dear Lord, I think I just felt it move. See, life isn’t easy. Some days you’re on top of the world, some days you have a bug lodged in your sinuses and you kill a squirrel. It’s all relative. It’s all cyclical. You have good days and you have bad days. What was the song? You have going half sad days? I can’t find it on Google, which means I’ve made the lyrics up, if you know me, you aren’t surprised (there’s nothing a hundred men on Mars wouldn’t do…I bless the rains down in Africa) The point is. Life is a roller coaster of emotion, of ups and downs, of twists and turns. It’s never going to be what you imagined or planned.

So you have a choice, accept this so-called life and embrace it or wallow in it. It’s not an easy choice, don’t be mad at me, don’t say “I try”, don’t tell me I’m downplaying the hurt or the emotion or the loss or the hopelessness. It’s not easy for me either. I spend days worrying. I spend countless hours fretting. I panic and I rage and I pray and I hope and I cry. I don’t have the answers either. I’m more imperfect then I care to admit. In fact, I’m writing this because I’m trying to make sense of my life right now. I’m trying to reconcile my dreams and my reality. I’m trying to move on. I’m trying to let go. And along the way I’ve discovered a few things I see as truths. A few things I find comfort in. A few things that when I’m at my lowest. When my thoughts are at their darkest. When I lie awake at night and cry silently into my pillow. These things come to me with the light of dawn and remind me, that as bad I think it is, there is still good. There is still hope.

So this is my top ten list, Dave Letterman watch out. I’ve been putting some of it on Facebook as my Monday Motivation, but a few friends asked me to put all in one place…so here it is. Go forth, be happy, in the end you’re the only person in the world who can control that.

1. Accept defeats and failures. Every loss is an opportunity to learn. Every beating is a chance to grow. I had a boss who told me once, “if you’re going to fail Leanne, fail fast, and move on”. It’s good advice.
2. If you love someone. Tell them. Fight for them. Don’t let distance, or past slights, or silence stop you from lifting them up. They may be going through something you don’t understand.
3. If you love someone and they don’t love you back. If they don’t value you. If they tear you down and make you feel less than whole, then you ignore #2 and you move on. You deserve more.
4. Don’t try to change people. Everyone is imperfect. Everyone has flaws. You need to find and surround yourself with people that have flaws you can live with. No one should ever be “your project”.
5. Learn to listen. I mean, really, listen. Don’t just nod and smile and think of your response. It’s ok to have an awkward silence and say “I’m processing what you said” before you respond.
6. If someone says you’ve hurt them, don’t rationalize it. Don’t justify it. Don’t defend yourself. Everyone has a different perception of this world. If they say you’ve hurt them, even if you think you didn’t, even if you think it’s silly…you’ve hurt them. Accept this, seek to understand this, and don’t do it again.
7. If you’re mad at someone or frustrated or annoyed, don’t ignore them. Don’t go silent. My sister has been writing a lot lately and today on Twitter she posted this poem and it ended with “I Am Not Your Silence, Anymore”. She may kill me for pilfering it, but it spoke to me. Everyone deserves an answer. Whether it’s convenient or not, everyone deserves an answer. Don’t be “that guy” (or girl) who doesn’t have enough compassion to just say what’s uncomfortable. You wouldn’t like it if it was done to you. So don’t do it to others.
8. Do unto others as you would want done unto you. The Golden Rule baby. It’s so easy to make snap judgments. To lash out. To hate. To tear down. We always talk about people who can dish it out but not take it. Don’t be that person. Covey was right, always seek first to understand. Always choose kindness.
9. Smile at strangers. This is actually a fun one. No matter where I am or what I am doing, at Target, Harris Teeter, downtown Concord, I walk, head up, and I smile at everyone I see. I say hi, I nod, I think I actually make some people uncomfortable, “why is this woman looking at me and smiling?”. Everyone deserves a smile.
10. Love yourself. Before anyone else can love you, you have to love you. You have to accept yourself and all your flaws and imperfections. This is the hardest one of them all. We live in a world that wants us to be thinner, prettier, smarter, richer, but that world is what tears us down. Learn to laugh at yourself and learn to love yourself. No one is perfect. No one is lacking demons. No one is better than you. My friend Erin used to say, “they put their pants on the same way you do in the morning” (or something similar).

At the end of the day, we’re all hamsters on the same wheel. We all have dreams and hopes and wants and aspirations. We’ll all fail and rise up. We’ll all cry and love and hate and judge. We’re all human. We all make mistakes. At the end of the day, I just want to make sure that I was kind, that I was understanding, that I didn’t hurt anyone, that I didn’t do harm. Maybe I was productive. Maybe I was awesome. Maybe I was a hot mess. Regardless, the sun is going to come up tomorrow. How are you going to greet it?