Ahh, winter is back. And colder than ever! Brr!
Living in New York has its ups and downs, but living here….makes
you live. Live like no other place. Live like you’ve
never known before. You’re exposed to things that
confirm that you were once ignorant. You become vulnerable
to new experiences and life changes. You understand what
the mere means of survival requires. People feel cursed
at times living here because of the countless “only
in NY” moments, but it’s those times you realize
that you’re at a place that is like no other. Sure
there are times when I want to push and shove everyone around
me, but it’s also those times where I realize that
this is a place where you CAN push and shove and get away
with it. That my friends, is freedom.
When I first moved here, I felt alone. Alone, like…..alone.
Yes there were friends and significant others, but a feeling
of desolate wonder filled my being. This is when I discovered
who I was and was able to differentiate for the first time
in my life, what it was that I wanted. I wanted freedom.
I wanted no barriers. I wanted to understand me, for me.
Having been through relationships that have both succeeded
and failed, I became who I am. “I’d rather have
loved than have not loved at all,” deems so true in
my life. Heartbreaks, disappointments, betrayals all have
made me who I am. Everyday, someone out there undergoes
this horrible experience and for those….I lend out
my hand. I lend this hand not to help, but to heal. No matter
what you’ve been through, you didn’t deserve
it. No one ever does.
Nobody can tell you what you did was right or wrong. How
can one blame another for following their heart? If you
felt at that time that he/she was worth the fight, then
it was. For those out there that are still struggling with
the fight, ask yourself if you can accept them for who they
are today. Not yesterday, not tomorrow…..today. If
they’re cheating on you, lying to you, beating you…..how
is that acceptable? It’s not. You’re worth more
than that. For those who are heartbroken due to finding
out your significant other cheated/lied/betrayed you, listen….although
you feel helpless and hopeless at this point, it’s
not the end of your love life. God allows things to happen
for a reason. Always. Cry, weep, depress…..but for
not too long or it will tear you apart. Do it just enough
so you can start crawling up to a walk. It will not completely
mend your soul, but it will also not close your door to
new openings. You will survive and the heartbreak would
have been worth it….
Here’s a story I want to share with you….
“When I was a kid in elementary school we took a trip
to the art museum. This woman was taking us through and
explaining everything to us and we come upon this painting
of Icarus. So the woman tells us the story of Icarus and
how he and his father, Daedalus, escaped from the labyrinth
using man-made wings. She told the story and was describing
how Icarus was so overjoyed with flight that he kept flying
higher and higher until the beeswax that was holding his
wings together began melting (because he was too close to
the sun). I could just imagine how wonderful that felt.
The wind in his eyes and the sun on his shoulders….
She gets to the end of the story and Icarus' wings fell
apart and he was crushed on the rocks off the coast of Sicily.
So she looks at us and gives us the moral of the story (because
every good Greek tragedy has to have a moral) and she says,
“the moral is that you should always trust your elders
and if you do that, things will always go right.”
Now, I'm in about the third grade and I'm looking at her
and I'm looking at the picture and I'm thinking that I know
that this can't be the moral because the grownups I know
don't always steer me in the right direction. As I look
at the picture, I can see Icarus smiling so I just blurt
out, “He's smiling.”
This woman is totally disgusted. “He can't be smiling.
He's dead. The moral has to be that you should listen to
your elders. Everything went wrong because he didn't listen.”
But I know he's smiling. So I look at her and I say : Icarus
flew.
And I was right. Sometimes you have to take those risks.
And for those few moments Icarus knew something that no
man had ever known before. He felt the wind in his face
and the sun on his shoulders. He flew. And if you take that
kind of risk then you may find yourself broken on the rocks.
But you will have flown. And that's what love is. It's flight.
And that risk is always worth the few minutes of flight.”
About Gina Kwak
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