Under the label of survival, there are times when retreating makes sense for us.
When existing steps in because there is an awareness of feeling small.
In hope sounding different and fear having us trained in the reasons why it does.
And in lonely making us cry while strength has a framework that we can’t fit into.
Under the label of all right, hesitation shows up in fewer moments.
Artwork isn’t always lit up because of the weather.
Hope can crawl out from under the rubble.
And blaming ourselves for not always stepping strongly doesn’t escalate to shouting.
Under the label of love, there are fewer biased opinions as we walk.
A softening of the identities found in the layers of lived evidence.
A breathing of the hope that stands by our picking ourselves every day.
And an understanding that strength isn’t experienced the same way in the mind as it is in the heart.
These are three different guides for climbing and falling in the conversations of our homes.
Of how we say hello to the weeds that grow anyways.
Of our shifting thoughts along the journey of rooting and being open.
Of how we color hope and strength with our tears as well as our swagger.
While patience struggles with exhaustion from the long suffering.
In being somewhere between doubt that doesn’t dream and hope’s assurances.
And in noticing that not every location has flowers on its approved list of travel companions.
Because when pain talks back, wishes feel exactly the same as the weight of responsibility does.
When touring the mid-section, hope’s decline is felt even though it never really says good-bye.
And when yes shines, the focus of freely writing is on keeping that particular flame alive.
But survival doesn’t need to silence happiness if it’s allowed to be grumpy in the same
room that a belly full of laughter can at the very least smile in.
What the scenery has to offer doesn’t have to be a failure if that landscape isn’t made to feel bad that some ideas just don’t fit within its framework.
And the map can be clearer if hope and strength are understood in the actual place that they currently happen to be in.
Because it’s not that one of those labels is really better than the others.
But it is the pushing of love away from imperfect sections that confuses us.
It is the temptation of searching for a better us to come home to that muddies our works of art.
And it is the cautionary tale of our realness that makes cutting the truth off feel beneficial.
So, in all fairness, we don’t have to hold tightly to hope for happiness; we just need to let go of labels that tell us that we aren’t strong enough to grow any flowers when in the concrete of survival.
Have the best day, POSSIBLE for you. Love Always, Heavell
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