what if this was the life you begged for?
I didn't ask to be here... or did I?
This morning in the shower, listening to Noah Kahan, I closed my eyes as the warm water caressed my scalp and ran down my waist-long hair, feeling the weight of my strands as they absorbed the run-off like a weighted blanket.
In that moment I was as present as a person could be. Doing something so mundane and ordinary, I couldn’t help but feel emotion wash over me like it was the very water coming out of the shower head.
It reminded me of a poem that I recently heard from Lena Karla that blew my existence apart and has had me in a chokehold ever since:
What if this life
was the one that we begged for
What if my higher power let me come back
so that I could see mountains again
Be on the lake while the sun kissed me
laugh with my friends until my stomach hurts
get my heart broken over, and over
cry uncontrollably in the shower
buy myself flowers a thousand more times
hear a beautiful song for the first time
or fall in love
What if I made a promise
that I would never forget the miracle of being here
How many times in my life have I said “I didn’t ask to be here”?
Too many to count.
When I have to pay taxes or sit at the DMV, when I’m struggling financially—really any time I’m doing something that would be generally counted as “adulting”… why do I have to be subject to the idiotic, asinine, nonsensical, trivial, and even heinous parts of living in the western world in 2024?
I didn’t ask for this.
But what if I did?
Yes, it would be nice to frolic around in the mountains, go on great adventures, and not know what a 1040-ES form is. But surely, if that were the case, I would have other problems.
Despite the hassles, headaches, and hurdles of life, there is profound beauty to be found.
In feeling the crushing pain of loving someone who doesn’t love you back.
In the way the earth smells after it rains.
In the blistering disappointment of a dream falling apart.
In the way crawling into fresh sheets feels after a long, exhausting day.
In the way the sun feels on your skin when you lay on a warm rock to dry off after jumping in an ice-cold lake.
In every moment, there is profound beauty. We simply need to tune into the present to see it.
And to have the courage to feel whatever each moment has in store for
us.
And I would argue, as would many others before me, that not only can beauty not exist without pain, but that there is beauty in the pain itself.
incredibly delightful.
and what's surreal is that i thought about this notion earlier today, when i took a warm shower and then had dinner. then i saw your writing. incredible sincronicity.
This is so beautifully written and thought provoking!