The gentle breeze tickles my legs, ruffling my gauzy skirt while at the same time, ever so slightly, but rythmically rocking me in my back porch swing. My two cats languidly stretch out on the adjacent daybed squinting at me in purring approval at my choice about joining them for a midmorning cup of tea.
I breathe in and out the refreshing perfumed air tinged with tangy herbs, sweet roses, and musky soil. The background symphony of birdsong, chattering squirrels, pecking chickens, and tinkling wind chimes are playing my kind of music!
Just as I’m totally engrossed in the thought, “I love my life” this love and peace party is crashed by a lawn mower across the street, construction workers next door, and a distant siren piercing through it all. In a millisecond, I’m transported from the comforting arms of my garden sanctuary to the cold reality of life.
I’m reminded again that as I rest in my rare moments of certainty, frequent uncertainty that used to unravel me, doesn’t anymore. Tears and consolation, anger and empathy, sadness and hilarity, foreboding and calm, captivity and resilience, hopelessness and resourcefulness, all live concurrently. The intimacy of both do not diminish the strength of either one.
My life is a tangled paradox of complicated experiences. But you know what? The whole of it is mine; my experience, my story. It is definitely at times unintelligibly chaotic and messy, but still authentic.
I challenge you to be your authentic self with all its contradictions; not the insta-grammable, made-up-over, light-filtered pseudo-self. Live in the contradictions, in the garden sanctuary and the noisy interruptions. Find your sanctuary. Rest in it so that you have strength to persevere through the hard times.
Can you dare to be vulnerable without any deceptions?
A good name smells sweeter than the finest ointment, and the day of death is better than the day of birth. Better to visit the house of mourning than the house of feasting; for to be mourned is the lot of every man, and the living should take this to heart. Grief is better than laughter; a sad face may go with a cheerful heart.