To Live...

A while back then a friend said something to me:

"I would prefer to give everything I have and live for just that moment than to live a sham of a life never expressing my feelings and sharing with others." - A. McIntyre

So many times in life, I feel like I've gone out there and I've hoped, I've tried. And in the end so often, just so, so often, I feel like I've fallen on my face. Like I've done it all wrong. It's seems like if there could have been a mistake, I would have made it. And sometimes I've felt like there was no way that I could do anything right. And sometimes, it makes me want to just run and hide. Hide from a world where so much seems wrong, where so much seems broken.

But...

I've honestly struggled, and tried to do the best that I could. I've loved. I've laughed. I've cried. And in the end, I wouldn't trade it at all. Despite the hurt, the pain, the disappointment, I still think that it has been worth it.

It's the moment when I feel the vibrations from a musical instrument as they carry a piece of soul from the one who plays it. The moment when I stand on a rock hundreds of feet above the ground and feel the wind sweep around me, almost as though it could carry me away. The moment when I see the pure joy in a child as it plays. The moment when I see a tiny new blade of grass pushing to the surface from a soft, brown, mother earth. The moment when I stand out on a bluff and watch the sun set, it's golden rays spreading out across the sky above me. The moment when I look deep into another persons eyes, and I see a piece of their soul. And those moments when I sit and watch the stars, and everything is so quiet that I could hear a pin drop. And I wonder....I wonder who? Who can fathom something so grand? Something so wonderful?

Those moments, they are the moments that I feel loved. And those are the times when I believe that if I continue to try my best, things will work okay.

So, like my friend so beautifully said, don't settle for a sham of a life. Give everything you have, because in the end, it will be worth it.

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This photo is taken at The Red Butte Gardens at the University of Utah.