On a plane thousands of feet in the sky, I watch the wings float through the air. To anyone on the ground, we are flying so fast—yet, I can follow the flicker of a single light as we move, almost as if in slow motion. And that’s how so many things in life are, aren’t they? Different depending on where we’re standing, different depending on the story we tell.

Tonight I am struck by the shifts all around me—how something can appear to be so set, so steady, but be crumbing in the foundation underneath. How quickly something moves when we’re looking from a distance, yet can hardly feel the subtleties when we’re in the midst. And how we can feel we know, without a doubt, and then a moment changes before our eyes.

Truthfully, the things we take for granted, the things we trust are so fleeting, so momentary—everything is.

I sound morbid, but I’m not. I’m reminding myself of life’s impermanence, and how this can be scary, but something to push us. Something to encourage us to grab all that we can without fear.

So often we find ourselves walking on what we believe is solid ground beneath our feet, but nothing in this world is for certain—not the people we love, not the paths we take, not the jobs we pursue or the mistakes that leave us empty.

Yet as much as that’s disheartening, it’s beautiful, too.

It’s beautiful that you could be looking at the same stars in the sky and see two different things—freedom or angst. Beautiful that you could love someone with the entirety of you, and only begin to teach them to let you in.

And it’s beautiful, albeit messy, that sometimes there are no answers at all.

Tonight I’m watching the plane wings, the twinkling lights, and I’m falling into thoughts about change. Something about travel always does this to me—perhaps it’s the feeling of the entire world below my body, or maybe the way, on this plane, I have no control. But I am thinking about the temporary nature of the world we live in—temporary feelings, temporary bodies, temporary homes.

Nothing is for certain, yet why do we live as if forever is promised to us? Why do we believe that we have endless days to be, to live, to waste? And why do we worry about the things we don’t quite understand, especially when we’ve seen, time and time again, that the answers will reveal themselves to us in time?

We want to know. We want to know that we’re loved, that things will work out, that our journeys will weave themselves around the right people for our ‘happily ever after.’ When we close our eyes, we focus on the things we think we deserve and desire—never recognizing that there is power in our broken moments, too, and sometimes those lessons are not what we want, but exactly what we need.

And then, sometimes there are no answers.

Sometimes people walk away and leave us breathless and empty, or do the exact opposite of what we want them to do, giving us no choice but to run. We can jump forward into something, only to fall flat on our face. We can believe and realize we were chasing the wrong thing all along.

Sometimes what lies beneath us isn’t as steady as we think. But in these moments, we must close our eyes and take steps forward, believing, wholeheartedly, that we will find our footing again.

We must have faith that there is a reason, or a lesson, or some sort of purpose. We must let go, and simply trust.

All of this will cease to exist one day—but what does that say about the way we live right now? Perhaps, above all, it’s a reminder to live as if today is our last day. Because it could be.

And are we truly living it, truly and fearlessly embracing the unknowns?
 

Featured Image Credit: Ryan Rippeon