this one is about the double-edged sword that is regret
i work across the street from my high school. or, at least it was my high school 11-15 years ago. from my desk i can see students shuffling around. from class to class. from class to their cars. or just partaking in the general meandering of high school. do you remember that meandering? i sure do. it's the meandering of having a bathroom pass and not quite being ready to get back to class. the meandering of youth.
i think i remember those years. although i'm sure i don't. i remember blips. small pictures of that life. but i don't understand the me from those days. why i was who i was. why i wasn't who i wanted to be. was it really that hard? *sigh*
around 4 i glanced over and saw cheerleaders flipping around in the distance. back and forth. handsprings. cartwheels. flips without hands (do they have a name?). it is hard to know i wanted that then. that life. i tried out for cheer at the end of 8th grade but wasn't a great tumbler. and i was pretty much super dorky. and that is an understatement. but who knows why i didn't make it. i'm gonna guess the latter. but the weirdest part is that i still want that life. not to be forever 15. (shudder) but to be able to will my body to fly around. to cheer until my voice goes hoarse. and at the same time, it's so not my crowd. can you imagine me surrounded by air-heady blondes with huge fake boobs? oh goodness.
just give me the gymnastics. that'll tide me over.
but now, at 28, i wouldn't change anything about my life. had i been on cheer, i would be a completely different person. with a completely different life. i mean, there are a bazillion (to the 20th power) outcomes. and i don't want any of them except the one that i have.
so i've been trying to wrap my head around being happy about my past because each moment of it has created my present. but watching those happy and beautiful and limber girls flipping and cheering and being popular and having what i wanted so badly...
regretting is so pointless. there is no going back. no undoing. no redoing. there is only now. today and tomorrow. if i'm lucky. and if i ever want something so badly as i wanted to be a cheerleader, i know that it isn't going to come to me...i'll have to get off of my butt and make it happen for myself.
*experience is what you get when you don't get what you want*
this has been my mantra lately. i would like to learn from my mistakes without looking back and regretting them. know that each and every moment of my life is what it is for a specific reason. and that i am, and have been, in control. so i will continue to want. but i will strive to only learn from that wanting. and the getting and the not-getting alike.
i think i remember those years. although i'm sure i don't. i remember blips. small pictures of that life. but i don't understand the me from those days. why i was who i was. why i wasn't who i wanted to be. was it really that hard? *sigh*
around 4 i glanced over and saw cheerleaders flipping around in the distance. back and forth. handsprings. cartwheels. flips without hands (do they have a name?). it is hard to know i wanted that then. that life. i tried out for cheer at the end of 8th grade but wasn't a great tumbler. and i was pretty much super dorky. and that is an understatement. but who knows why i didn't make it. i'm gonna guess the latter. but the weirdest part is that i still want that life. not to be forever 15. (shudder) but to be able to will my body to fly around. to cheer until my voice goes hoarse. and at the same time, it's so not my crowd. can you imagine me surrounded by air-heady blondes with huge fake boobs? oh goodness.
just give me the gymnastics. that'll tide me over.
but now, at 28, i wouldn't change anything about my life. had i been on cheer, i would be a completely different person. with a completely different life. i mean, there are a bazillion (to the 20th power) outcomes. and i don't want any of them except the one that i have.
so i've been trying to wrap my head around being happy about my past because each moment of it has created my present. but watching those happy and beautiful and limber girls flipping and cheering and being popular and having what i wanted so badly...
regretting is so pointless. there is no going back. no undoing. no redoing. there is only now. today and tomorrow. if i'm lucky. and if i ever want something so badly as i wanted to be a cheerleader, i know that it isn't going to come to me...i'll have to get off of my butt and make it happen for myself.
*experience is what you get when you don't get what you want*
this has been my mantra lately. i would like to learn from my mistakes without looking back and regretting them. know that each and every moment of my life is what it is for a specific reason. and that i am, and have been, in control. so i will continue to want. but i will strive to only learn from that wanting. and the getting and the not-getting alike.
Labels: life as meditation
posted by emily b. at
9:25 PM
1 Comments:
Ok... I'm in the middle of quite a lot of want myself lately. But YOU are seriously making me hear the Smiths, "Please, please, please, let me, let me, let me... let me, get what I want, this time." Might have to blog about this.
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