I wish…

I wish I was more evolved, more understanding, more committed. I wish I better understood the toil, the turmoil, and the suffering. I simply wish…

I wish I knew then what I know now. I wish I could turn the hands of time to a moment when I was lost, point in a direction and say “you want to go that way!” I wish I could have brought the eternal knowledge of a million lifetimes into those moments when I knew not what I was doing and then forgive even the slightest of trespasses. I wish I could have seen the light when it was but a slight glimmer in the corner of my life, and I wish I could have then embraced those moments I can’t seem to let go of now.

I wish I would have told you more. I wish I could have shown you more. I wish that in the weakness of my darkest hours I could see the strength of the lighted path that was unfolding before me. I wish those stars I once gazed upon could have shaken me from my slumber before the end came, and I wish that I had simply been able to feel then all that I feel now. I wish I could have built on the laughs and the promises of things to come. I wish I could have known that each moment, each embrace, wasa countdown to an end my mind could not foresee.

I know it was not meant to be. I know it is as it has to be. I know that in the hidden tears of my heart the song of joy is sung loudly and with a chorus of a million seconds as they whiz by.  I know that the memories and the pictures kept no longer turn my world to black even as they draw me to the wishing.well. Here, at this well, I do not draw on a want of something in the future but rather on the desire of a different past. Here the well does not quench my thirst but dries me out, leaving me wanting for something I cannot find and needing something I will never have.

I know I am not a victim, but a great procreator. I have given birth to each new path, each new step on this journey to the unknown. Here, the part of me grateful that I cannot change the past arises as a Warrior. I stand in a certain resolve not to suffer from the mist of the past, but rather be strengthened by it. It is no longer a fight to be won but a surrender to the experience of acceptance. Here I ride the wave as an active participant bent not on directing the water but rather surviving the ride toward the shore. Each tumble through the rough break strengthens my balance, each rough smash of skin and bone through the surface of the foamy abyss strengthens my stride as I swim toward the next swell. I will not stop, and I will not let the reefs or beasts of the sea keep me from my destiny.

It’s time, my friends, to rise and speak our labored truth. It’s time to dismantle the conditioning of our ancestors and to no longer seek the path already tread. It’s time we learn from our mistakes and turn them into the type of perfections that turn mere mortals into saints in the eyes of unknowing gods. It’s time to make new mistakes rather than to repeat the ancient ones, and it is time to find new cures to old ideas not in the hopes of not suffering, but rather in the real promise of becoming wise in the torment. If we must cry, let’s cry tears that create a wave taking us to new places. If we must feel pain let it drive us to new areas of comfort. If we must feel loss let us not grasp it but rather allow it to push us toward something true to hold on to.

I just long to make it all meaningful and worthwhile. I wish to honor the loss with a great discovery. I wish to find the truth in the midst of the great lie. I wish to know the wisdom in the throes of my own ignorance. I no longer wish to read your book but rather write my own. I want to redefine my experience not just from this moment on, but from the beginning. I no longer want to know the sunrise through your eyes, but rather create it from my own.

I love. I love you. I love you all. Peace.