For something different this week, I wanted to share the words of my good friend Yohanne with everyone. Yohanne is a writer, a musician, an all around insightful guy, and his words below are powerful -- a merit to anyone who reads them.
So without further ado, please enjoy this week's guest post "Yesterday, Today & Tomorrow."
Yesterday...
Today
& Tomorrow
Life is interesting.
We wake up each day and those of us with the most basic of instincts repeat certain patterns, we brush our teeth, we take a shower or a bath, get dressed, go to school or work, at some point we eat and/or drink something to sustain ourselves and at some point later, we return home... We expect another day out of pure ignorance of the fact that every day we've had has been a gift, we go to bed and repeat this basic cycle almost every day...
But in between the basics, we fill our lives with these differences, we maybe make friends, go to ball games, play video games, go shopping, take vacations, spend time with family or those we consider family. We connect, we have built entire civilizations through connecting yet... the most basic of human connections is still so fragile. We've spent years becoming the characters we are and sometimes we meet people that make us wanna be better or worse...
We've grown attached to the idea of being connected... 'No man is an Island' they say, but even through wanting to connect we build these walls that others must traverse to truly find us. 7 billion people on this earth and a good chunk are damaged goods, broken people in some way shape or form going about healing and or trying to. We create fantasies of what makes us happy, we try to build our lives to live up to fantasies and we forget that all we have is every day, every day is a gift..
Yesterday...
Today
& Tomorrow
You know, I have met, known, made and lost connections with hundreds if not thousands of people in my lifetime and if life has taught me one thing, it's this. All we have, to the best of our knowledge... all we have.. is yesterday, today and tomorrow. No more, no less. It breaks my heart sometimes when I see people not appreciating the gift of life. Yeah, there are hardships, we all have our own wars, our own battles we deal with whether externally or internally, we all have a lot to deal with but we do not have to forget to live. We shouldn't forget to live and to embrace life and embrace the people we are blessed to know.
Life isn't a movie you know, it's not an epic adventure, it's not a sweeping romance, it's not an action movie or some Oscar worthy drama... it's all of the above and more. In real life, there are no super heroes, Batman isn't swooping in to save the day, though every now and then we meet people that might as well be. But don't ever let your mind blur the lines between fantasy and reality, in movies, there are finite endings, and a lot of them tend to be happy... in real life, all there is, is the moment, all you have is your yesterday, your today and if you're lucky.. your tomorrow. Your family isn't perfect and they never will be, your friends and friendships aren't perfect, they'll survive if you fight for them, and your love life, well we all know what a battlefield that is...
The point is, life's imperfect, depending on who, when and where you are, life's unforgiving... I'm glad I wasn't born in the 60s, I'm glad I live in an age where it's okay to go to dinner with my white friends and not get in trouble with 'the law', I'm glad I can have friends, an education, a roof over my head, people that care about me and people I care about. But life will never be perfect, it has its ups and downs and you see the ripples in every facet of your life.. BUT
As imperfect and unforgiving as life is, it's still a gift, and if you're lucky, you'll have family and friends you don't hate, if you're really lucky, you'll meet someone who makes you smile, and if you're even luckier, you'll have the same effect on them. Then if you're really really really lucky, you'll get to share this gift with them. And they'll be to you as a cloudless moonlit night is to a writer or a hopeless romantic... if you don't know what I mean by that last example, I hope you find out some day. And between now and then, I hope you'll remember that all there is in life, is yesterday, today and tomorrow. That's all there is... no happy endings, just hopefully another day and another chance to make it as happy as you can.
Don't waste it,
Not everyone I've ever been blessed to meet is still alive to read this, and I hope that before they lost this gift, that they had a happy yesterday and a happy today, cause they never got their tomorrow.
~Yohanne Mwale
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