Truths I didn't understand until this night.

Project 365 * 4
Day 643

     A few years ago, I broke my laptop in a moment of anger. And because the only computer I can use takes at least ten minutes to get going, I have at least ten minutes each night to look through things in my computer/storage/library/things from our past, room. Tonight, during my ten minutes, I was flipping through an old journal of mine. Filled with nonsensical writings on fear and life, and just the general musings of a teenager filled with angst and self-doubt. But every twenty pages or so, there are glimpses of truth and hope. Truths that I wanted to make mine. And hopes that I clung to in my younger years.

"What you think, you will become--good or bad, strong or weak, victorious or defeated. So practice being a positive thinker in a time like this." -Norman Vincent Peale

"No matter how dark things seem to be, or actually are, raise your sights and see the possibilities--always see them, for they're always there." -Norman Vincent Peale

"Fear is not the opposite of courage. Fear is the catalyst of courage." -Joan D. Chittister

"I'm going to try to work it out so at the end it'll be a pure guts race. And if it is, I'm the only one who can win." -Steve Prefontaine

"Those people in the forest...what did you see on them? ...Fear. Deep, rotting fear. They were infected by it. Did you see? Fear is a sickness. It will crawl into the soul of anyone who engages it. It has tainted your peace already. I did not raise you to see you live with fear. Strike it from your heart. Do not bring it into our village." -Flint Sky from Apocalypto

"People living deeply have no fear of death." -Anais Nin

"You must do the thing you think you cannot do." -Eleanor Roosevelt

"I'm not afraid of storms, for I'm learning how to sail my ship." -Louisa May Alcott

"Fear not for the future, weep not for the past." -Percy Bysshe Shelley

"Yet for me--listen well--

My delight is the exquisite.

Yes, for me,

Glitter and sunlight and love

are one society.

So I shall not go creeping away

to die in the dark:

I shall go on living with you,

loving and loved." -The Love Songs of Sappho

     Tonight, at dinner, Matt told me how proud he was of me...how ten years ago, the stuff going on in the world today would make me insane with fear and crippled by panic attacks. But tonight, I can say with absolute certainty and confidence that my truths are these:

1. Being thankful will completely transform one's life.
2. There is good.
3. Love.

     When you live your life by those three truths, there just isn't any room for fear. Or doubt. Or anger. Or depression. Or panic attacks. There isn't any time for it. And really, when I think about it, it all seems quite silly. To think that I used to spend all my minutes worrying is just plain sad.

     Tonight, I'm thankful that I could look back on my journal, find truths that I wanted to make mine, and realize as I sat down to write...that I have arrived at my destination.