So I didn't really expect to learn another life lesson while I was on my float trip. So guess what... I learned a life lesson. Crazy how that works, right? Right. You go on a float trip with two of your best friends and you expect to have fun and relax and life is like: "Lol, no, it's time to have another epiphany Tyler." It's a conspiracy. I swear it is. I really did have fun on the float trip, though. And this is me saying "thank you" to my friends who decided to deal with me for a whole weekend in the middle of Nowhereville, Missouri. In an empty raft, on an empty and slow moving river. The best part, though, is when the radio called us beautiful and told us we have that one thing that shot them out of the sky. OH! And if you need a good movie to watch, go watch The Client. It's an older film, but it's SO GOOD. I'm getting off topic, though. I could write a book about how the float trip was pretty much perfect in every way.
Digressing...
Most of you that know me know that I tend to think a lot. A lot of thinking leads to over thinking and in my case over thinking is bad news because 99% of the time those thoughts aren't what I'd like to call "balls of sunshine and happiness." Not even close. Well... bad habits die hard. However, this time my over thinking allowed me to arrive at another life conclusion:
Life is going to throw you a TON of shit. It's like you're running a race at a track meet, and the hurdles are the difficulties life sets in front of you. Now, you may be a great hurdle racing person, but for nonathletic kids like me, the odds are you tried to jump the hurdle and you face planted. Hard.
Now in this race that I like to refer to as "life," everyone face plants at some point. I don't care how good at running or how Kenyan you are. You're gonna face plant. An example of a "life hurdle" is over thinking. For some reason, I was blessed (cursed, but I'm trying to sound grateful) with the horrid fact that I over think EVERYTHING. Boom. Face plant. Times sixty-seven.
The fact that you're going to face plant and trip over a few hurdles is inevitable. How you deal with tripping over that hurdle is key, though. You can sit there and give up. That'd be the easy way out. Whine and complain because the big bad hurdle got in your way. Go run a different race, an easier, one without hurdles. Where's the sense of accomplishment when you finish though? You could also just lay in the middle of the track and become another obstacle others have to watch out for while they run their race. I did that. I hate to admit it, but I did. I still do on occasion.
OR you can get back up and keep running. Find some motivation. Give yourself a reason to keep running that race.
My reason is because every time I fell down, someone cared enough to help me back up. Especially here recently. I know I talk about them a lot, but I have four of the best friends you could ever have. EVER. Since I started my junior year of high school at least one of them has been there to help me up every time I fell down. Every time.
I have the friend who shares my love for music. We can fan boy/girl hard over classical music and Sarah Chang together. Nobody else understands our love for classical string music quite like the other does. But on top of that I can still count on her to have my back and exchange fears of upcoming chair auditions (THOSE ARE THIS MONTH, BY THE WAY), or contest, or other non-music related things. So whoever said a guy and a girl can't be best friends... you are an idiot... and I'm guessing you lived with your mom until you were 30. At least. So HA.
Then there's the friend who I can be totally loud and obnoxious with and we don't judge each other. We usually just try and be louder than the other person. Whether we're quoting Spongebob, Mean Girls, or talking about how we're going to be ready for the Zombie Apocalypse, it's just so easy for us to have fun around each other. We were probably related in a past life. Not siblings... we get along too well to be siblings. Close cousins is probably accurate.
I have to group these last two together. They're like the brothers I always wanted... but it would be unfair to any one set of parents to have the responsibility of watching after all 3 of us for any extended period of time that lasts more than 3 days. "LET'S GO ON A NATURE WALK, GUYS!" We then promptly get chased by what sounded to be like a rather massive and vicious dog. I don't actually know what the dog looked like. It was dark and I was hauling ass in the opposite direction. These two remind me, though, that I don't have to live life being so wound up and stressed all the time. They do a very good job of just mellowing me out. It's like an emotional massage... I just get to relax. And when I do start over thinking stuff they kindly tell me that I'm being an idiot and I need to just stop thinking for a little bit.
See, I never said you had to run your race alone. I definitely would have given up a long time again if these people hadn't cared enough to tell me to get back up and get my butt in gear. They serve as my motivation to keep running. And if I trip over another hurdle, they'll help me up again. Of course, as friends they're entitled to laugh at the fact that I fell down first. That's how it works.
Life, in its own way, is a race. There is no set distance. You just run. Hurdles are a part of the race. I hope you jump over most of them and they turn you into a better person with killer calf muscles. Some of them are going to pop up unexpectedly and knock you down though. The stadium is jam packed with people. Some of them would love nothing more than to watch you fail. Why would you give them that satisfaction? You will fall down. People will be there to see it. I hope you have the motivation to get back up, though. Keep running, so that way when you do finish the race, you can look back at everything you accomplished and be happy with the race you ran. The only person you're competing with in this race is yourself.
How can you lose?
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