Life as an adventure

It is both daunting and beautiful -- life. But only if it is seen as an adventure. True adventures are scary because unlike their counterfeits, you seldom have it your way. But the beauty of it comes when we begin to see that it's never the point to have it our way with life but rather allow it to teach and instruct us as it may, even when it costs us. It is often the price not paid that would eventually cost us the most.

As I sat in my bed struggling to separate an assault of imagination from the reading at hand, an exceedingly beautiful picture entered my mind. I saw in my mind's eye a lady I love most dearly cuddling up to me on a similar winter night as this, as if she would lose me the moment she let go of her grip. Then the daunting came in the form of a truth, distant as it might seem -- but no less true. If the same winter night could not steal her away from me, there bound to be another that would. A wise sage once made an observation of beauty and affliction going hand-in-hand in life. That encapsulates the entire essence of a true adventure -- that it is desirable and unbearable both at the same time! If we were to truly live, choose we simply cannot.

But let affliction come in due season. Now is a time of gathering stones. Beauty fades when it is not desired, so it must be pursued.