The show must go on!

01/12/22

I can't believe it's December already! I guess time flies when your life is falling apart.

From opening the year with a war that disrupted my studies, to ending it with the highest stress levels I've probably ever been in - 2022 has been a lot and I'm happy to say goodbye and open a new chapter. The online community and everyone around me tells me that 2022 was not only a hard year for me but for so many of us and honestly reflecting on this past year will probably cause me more harm than good. However, how can we know where we're going if we refuse to face where we've been? Those who ignore history are bound to repeat it. To shed light on the shadows of 2022, maybe we should count the handful of blessings we received this year and use that hope to steer forward. 

I remember when 00:00 struck on the clock marking the 1st of January 2022 and how the sky erupted into a joyous thunder of fireworks of many colors. I remember the screams of excitement, the tears of joy, and the hugs and kisses. It didn't matter where you'd been a minute before or a day before. It mattered that you were in 2022. The blessing of just seeing that day was enough to wipe away any concerns that preceded the moment. 

I welcomed the new year surrounded by my family and by distant love from my friends all of who I had recently parted with due to circumstances beyond my control. I looked around and was exactly where I had always wanted to be. I hadn't seen my family in over 3 years due to being stuck in Europe because of the virus and was very thankful to have been given the opportunity to reunite with them again. On the other hand, I was sad that I had found myself there due to unfortunate circumstances. The painful memory of being ripped away from my normal life with almost no warning was still haunting me and still haunts me to this day. 

A couple of months went by and rumors of wars were heard coming from the north and wouldn't you know it, I went from being stuck in Russia to being stuck In South Africa. This paved way to many school-related issues for me but alas! There was nothing I could do either than go with the flow that the universe had chosen for me. I went from being the happiest version of myself to slowly but surely losing my mind and burrowing back into my hole of depression. I knew nothing could save me at that point. I felt alienated, powerless and hopeless. I started to live one day at a time, dreading every moment and wishing that the nights would never end. 

I wanted to sleep forever. Sleep provided me with a much-needed break from my devastating waking life and that's all I did. Sleep, wake up, study, sleep, wake up, study and this went on until the winter semester ended. Fifth year in the books! Getting to that accomplishment though had been a very mentally challenging road. But, I had my God-given accomplishment in the bag. All I had to do was wait for the summer semester to start and then I could go back to school. I could finally stop fighting demons that haunted me that I can't even begin to describe. I could finally go back to my normal life and rebuild myself, and that it would be easier as it would have been on a foundation that I already laid. I was so ready and excited. 

Enter Leo Season. What is usally the best season of my years, this year, turned around and used it's fire power to scorch me to ashes. Nothing was the same since Leo Season 2022. I had thought that I had been stressed in the early months of the year, but God definitely had been waiting to show me what it actually meant to be stressed and to lose one's will to live. In the space of days, I lost everything. My whole future seemed to vanish right before my eyes. I'm not willing to get into the details because I don't think that would be good for my mental health but woah. When I tell you I was so broken that I couldn't even cry, so tired that I couldn't even sleep, so dead inside that I couldn't even fake a will to live... chile. Only God knows how I got through those days - and how I still manage to go through them presently without unaliving myself.

Nothing was the same. The tides have been at an all time high ever since, but I'll say that I'm slowly learning to ride the waves. On top of all that happened during Leo Season, I lost the one good thing that I could always count on through thick and thin, and that threatened my balance even more. I was positive that I was going to die after I lost that person. This year life just kept kicking me in the face while I was already down and strugglging to come up. The story of my life. I'm still learning to keep my balance, and it hasn't been easy. God knows it hasn't been, but it gets easier. I think, eventually, we get used to pain, accept it, and create a home for it within ourselves. 2022 was a cursed year. No one can convince me otherwise. But, it is what it is. We move.

If there's one thing that has persisted through thick and thin, one thing that has kept me alive and war ready - it's my relationship with God and the universe. Where would I be if it had not been for the Lord on my side?

Above all things, I am grateful that I got to spend this year with my family. I reconnected with many loves from my family and built bonds with new ones. I'm a strong believer that our true friends are our family, so for God to bless me with this opportunity to reconnect with them has been the highlight of my year. From the road trips to the prayer circles, from the stories of our history to new discoveries about ourselves, for every moment and every detail, I thank God. Some of my loved ones went through heartbreaking moments of loss this year and for them, I utter a prayer unto God for their healing. 

I am grateful for all the tough love that God gave me this year through lessons, trials and tribulations. I mightn't know it now, but I'm sure the true purpose of my suffering shall be revealed someday. I am grateful that I rekindled my spiritual journey and that I got to explore that very important aspect of myself. Everything that happened to me probably happened for me. It all led to this journey. Since I started this journey, I've gotten reintroduced to a little thing called hope, and faith. No, I'm not okay, but I am looking forward to the next chapter of my life, and this time with hope. I hope you are too.

I am grateful to have completed my 5th year of medical school. This past academic year was the absolute worst, but I got through it and I made myself proud. Even though I'm at a standstill right now, I know the gears of motion are about to turn and I'm going to be ready for the new paradigm shift that's coming my way. Despite my losses, I will not lose sight of my purpose and I'll do my best to help myself achieve my dreams. Nothing will stand in my way, as nothing will stand in yours. All those tiny wins will one day amount to one giant win.

I am grateful for all my destiny helpers, the people that saved me without even knowing it. I'm thankful for my friends far and near, and I'm grateful for my love, who I lost, but who taught me so many things and was my rock to hold on to in a fleeting river. I'm thankful that God placed every person in my life for a reason, and that those reasons are so divine that they probably light my path every day without my awareness. I am thankful for our dog, whose very existence is the only thing that makes him enough. May God prepare a heaven for these little creatures. They are literal angels and they deserve many treats!

I am grateful that I am alive, even though I hate it. I am grateful that I am healthy and that I get to ride through the waves of life without physical constraints. I am grateful for the lives of the people that I love, well - the ones I have left. It is through them, that I see the hope for a new day. Whenever everything is just too heavy and I feel really over the edge, I often say to myself, "stick around and find out what kind of person your little sister will grow up to be" or "stick around to see how long Max will live" or something along those lines and that always makes me feel better. The mere existence of the people that I love makes me wanna see tomorrow. 

I am grateful for God's providence that has prevailed throughout the year. Through financial challenges, losses, and bad decisions, God always provided a way out. Through the harsh weather, God always made sure that we had a roof up above our heads and a good place to sleep. God always made sure that every day, there was food on our tables and shoes on our feet. Oftentimes, we take these small things for granted but imagine how life would be if our basic needs were not met. It would be unbearable. 

We could really spend all day counting our blessings. The honest truth is that we could spend all day counting our curses too, and we're justified to, but it wouldn't make us feel any better. With flight 2022 about to leave the airport for a destination past, we have to make sure that we don't accidentally get on that plane too. When we go through trauma, it can haunt us for eons and we often feel stuck in those traumatic moments for a while even as the calendar counts the days going by. We are only human beings. We are allowed to do that. What we shouldn't do, however, is to allow ourselves to be in this loop of pain forever. We're responsible for each other and for ourselves, and it is our duty to pick up and move. It is our duty to detach from the past and live in the present, in order to prepare for tomorrow. 

What's painful about this truth though, is that it's easier said than done. Whatever tiny amount of progress you make, or however small the step you take, is a sign of progress. If you managed to wake up and make your bed today, that's a huge improvement from yesterday, when you couldn't even wake up at all. It's almost curtain call, and the show is about to go on again. It must. There's no other way. On your way back to the stage, you may trip, you may fall, you may stop for an energizer, you may pause to tie your shoes, you may pause to look in the mirror and adjust your glasses, or many other things that could need your attention. Just make sure that at curtain call, you're there standing on that stage. 

We need to keep moving. Stagnancy doesn't do us any good. 2022 has been hard for a lot of us and challenges presented themselves in ways that we couldn't have imagined. For many of us, this year will forever represent failures, broken dreams, unimaginable goodbyes, losses, mental health decline, and many other unspeakable things. After all that, there's still tomorrow, and somehow, we're still expected to find the will to carry on. Fortunately, where there's a will, there's a way. We'll figure it out as we go I guess.

So, goodbye 2022. I know it's a little early to be saying this but bro, we are tired. We are so exhausted bro. I feel like an early goodbye is needed in order for us to cleanse ourselves from your horrors and prepare for the new year. We don't want to walk in there with PTSD. Personally, right now is no longer 2022. It's not 2023 either. It's the in-between. It's no man's time. I might even go forward from here and pretend that this year never even happened for real. So, goodbye 2022. You won't be missed, but the things that I learned this year can be found in my post secrets from a girl who's seen it all. 

From henceforth till the new year, may the Grace of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, the love of God, and the sweet fellowship of the Holy Spirit be with us now and forever more. Amen.

See you on the other side and long live Freddie Mercury!

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