GRATEFUL DESPITE YOU

“Feeling gratitude and not expressing it is like wrapping a present and not giving it.” – William Arthur Ward

As I sit here, staring at my screen, reflecting on this past year, I contemplate which direction to take. Do I scream and curse at everything 2020 has taken from me, or do I really look at what it has given me?

It’s easy to focus on the negative: the financial losses, the lack of human contact, the loss of affection, freedom, and certainty…so I’m choosing the more difficult option. Despite everything we have lost this year, I’m counting my blessings. I woke up this morning in a New Year, safe in bed with my little family, in our home. My little business is still running (despite everything happening around us), and I have no threat of losing my livelihood. I can pick up the phone and call my siblings, parents, and nephews. I am grateful despite you, 2020.

And despite you, as well, Leaders of our country. See, as I’m reflecting on my year, forced to stare at things beyond my control, things that cost my business revenue that can never be made back, cost us time with friends and family, caused excess cases of loneliness, depression, and anxiety, all through decisions that were NOT MINE, I realize those decisions were made by someone.

So, as I reflect, I’m hoping those decision-makers, OUR LEADERS, are doing the same. I’m hoping that they have enough of a conscience to really think about what they have cost our country. I hope they think about the millions of dollars they cost small businesses when they locked them all down for months at a time, and the BILLIONS of dollars they made for huge corporations when they simultaneously kept them open. I hope they remind themselves of all the revenue lost in restaurants when they took away half their tables, while I felt people’s breath on my neck at Costco. I hope they think of every unused creamer I sanitized, while someone touched every apple in the produce section at Walmart before deciding on one. I hope they think of the 80 yr-old woman who passed away alone, without seeing her grandchildren one last time, while 50 people wait in line at the LCBO. I hope they think of the 55 yr-old business owner who lost everything in multiple lockdowns, claimed bankruptcy, and took their own life in a depression, all while you, our leaders, collected your full salaries. I hope you think of the strain on the relationships, the anxiety, the drug addictions, the suicides, ALL OF IT, when you reflect on your year. While you spent holidays with your families, though you ordered us not to. While you vacationed at your cottage, while banning us from ours. While you treated us like children, giving us rules, while you did the opposite. I truly hope when you sit down and reflect on your year, you ask yourself, did my decisions make sense? Could I have done better? And then, DO BETTER.

I am choosing to be grateful because I’ve managed to keep everything I’ve worked for, despite everything you have done to take it away. Because when you worked against us – the little guys – our friends, families, and communities worked WITH us. I am so grateful for all of it. My friends, my family, my community…my life.

YOU’VE CHANGED

I was browsing through Instagram the other day, just scrolling through, half-involved, when my friend Nolan’s story made me pause. It was a meme, of course, with a caterpillar telling a butterfly “You’ve changed”. The butterfly swiftly responds, “We’re suppose to”. It hit me right in the gut.

How many times have you been in an argument with a partner and they accuse you of having changed? Your automatic reaction is to respond defensively, as though they’ve insulted you. But the reality is that you are doing exactly what you are supposed to do: you are evolving. And perhaps you are out-growing your surroundings.

A few years ago I went through a series of what I like to call “unfortunate events”. I remember hating myself, and thinking I just wanted to go back to being the NORMAL me. I wished away the anxiety I was starting to feel; I’d lay in bed staring at the ceiling wondering how I came to be someone I couldn’t understand or relate to anymore. I just wanted to go back to who I was before. Unfortunately, that girl didn’t exist anymore. I was lost.

But it doesn’t only happen to ourselves. How often have we been in a relationship and suddenly realized we don’t recognize our partner anymore? How many times have we met up with an old friend, only to discover that we have grown apart?

That is life. We are products of our experiences. We are meant to grow apart, so that we can find the person we can grow WITH. We are meant to experience hardship, so it can shape us into a stronger version of ourselves. We are meant to experience joy, so that we can share it with others. And every time we experience something, we are meant to CHANGE. You are never going to be the person you were yesterday, and that is a good thing. It means you are learning. You are absorbing the lessons, and letting them mold you.

Sometimes you have to become worse, before you can become better; that’s the hard part. We get temporarily lost, before we finally feel found. But we are products of our own experiences – works in progress – and everything that happens to us, every decision we make, helps morph us into our final product. So when you finally break out of that cocoon of broken promises, broken hearts, and broken dreams, you get to fully spread your wings and conquer NEW dreams, find new loves, and mend broken hearts.

“You’ve changed.”

“Thank you.”

I LOVE ME MORE

How long do you stay in a situation that doesn’t feel healthy anymore? After one incident? Two? Ten? Recently I had to end a friendship that had been a part of my life for 20 years. It was a difficult decision, and I was torn, but I had been contemplating this friendship and whether it was a healthy one for over 2 years. There is no denying I loved her, and still do, but there are so many things that no longer line up in our lives. I treat people I love calmly and respectfully, and that isn’t always the case with her, and that really bothered me. Witnessing it in her other relationships made me question the trust I had for her. Hearing some of the ways she spoke of her other friends made me wonder if she did the same to me. I’ve been on the receiving end of some toxic behaviour once or twice but the stuff I witnessed in her life sometimes…geesh.

It’s only when that behaviour was applied towards me, though, that I didn’t feel safe in that environment anymore. We tend to overlook certain things when they’re being done to others, but can we at least acknowledge that we see it? When you tell someone that something bothered you, and all they can come back with are empty apologies, rants, and “let me know when you’re over it”, well, I mean…never I guess??

Toxic relationships aren’t always obvious. Sometimes it’s as simple as one person putting in all the effort, sometimes it’s having to listen to the same complaints and drama over and over again, through numerous phone calls and texts, and sometimes it’s more serious…like cat-fishing, under-mining feelings, or emotional abuse. Many times, it’s a combination of all of those things. But it’s up to you to decide what is too toxic for you. How long or how much are you willing to put up with? Will you walk away at the first sign of it, or will you mourn the relationship from the past, and hang on way too long?

I treasure every memory I have with her, I always will. But there are certain things that relationships can’t recover from. Certain things that can’t be undone, or unsaid. In any past relationship I’ve had, hanging onto the pre-toxic love or friendship has only caused more hurt and bad behaviour, and so I guess I’ve learned from experience.

No matter how much I treasured that friendship, and appreciate everything we’ve been through together, and all the life lessons we learned along the way…no matter how many birthdays, road-trips, inside jokes…respect is an on-going thing. Without limits or deadlines. Toxic behaviour breeds more toxic behaviour. Each time it happens, and is accepted, it sets the new precedent for the relationship, making it more acceptable the next time. And you should always respect yourself more than letting yourself become anyone’s doormat, or punching bag.

And so, we move on. From friendships and loves, we learn to move on. Sometimes it’s easy, other times it hurts. For me, in this situation, it was time. I’m not willing to sacrifice my happiness over someone mistreating me. There are things you fix, and things you walk away from. So, no matter how much I love her, and a part of me always will, I will always, ALWAYS, love me more.

“Love is unconditional, relationships are not.”