May It Be as It Should
May 18th, 2017 by Kimberly
Ring the bell that still can ring. Forget the perfect offering. There is a crack in everything. That’s how the light gets in.
LEONARD COHEN
via Gratefulness.org
Adulthood is harder than I thought it would be on many levels. That’s saying something. I’m a worrier with a great imagination, and I can think up a lot of hardship.
Chief among the hard things, however, has to be letting go of the idea of the image of my life I hold in my head. I knew how my life was supposed to look. I would get married, I would have kids, I would have a successful, rewarding, fulfilling career in the arts and a house with a white picket fence. 
Okay, it was supposed to be a mansion outside London, but you get the idea.
How many of those things came to pass? Zero. In a world full of people telling you how to live your life, it’s easy to believe I screwed up somewhere, that I should have worked harder or prayed more or visualized my success more fully or something. But I’ve come to understand over the years that this is the life I have, whether by accident or grand design. I can spend all my time in the Land of Supposed to Be, mourning my losses, or I can enjoy what is.
The older I get, the more I embrace what is. With all its flaws – and some days, they are legion – it gives me endless gifts of empathy, humility and grace. Plus an adorable cat and some really damn funny friends, all of whom think that who I am – not who I thought I’d become, but who I really am – is quite enough.
Kimberly still wants the mansion. Self-cleaning, of course.
Who you are is pretty awesome! And … white picket fences get termites. XOXO
The you I know is more than enough. But I can sympathize with looking around and thinking, “This wasn’t at all what I’d planned on.”
You have such wisdom, Kimberly.