There’s an entire universe within us. We are connected to mysterious forces which we can’t perceive or understand, but which control the way we behave, the way we live our lives. Where do our thoughts come from? What is the origin of the ideas that catch our attention, sometimes even become obsessions? Where do our deepest dreams and desires arise from? So many questions to ask, so many mysteries to ponder. All we can do is live and learn. Life is weird, in every sense of the word. It’s so hard to make sense of, yet it feels like there’s some meaning behind it all, some reason to move forward despite, or even because of, all the suffering and pain. We all feel like the main character in a movie that is our life, and just like in the movies, we have to accept that life will have its conflicts. These are obstacles in the way of our dreams because life is a duality. These obstacles are ours to own, to face and to deal with, to overcome and to learn from. When we successfully rise above the challenges life throws at us is when we truly grow as human beings. So how can we properly face the challenges of everyday life? What if we fail to properly face these problems? We can’t face them if we don’t know who we are, if we are not at peace with ourselves, if we are trying to run from the truth. So the first step in our journey is to get to know ourselves, and to come to terms with whatever we find to be true about ourselves.

Just like life is weird, we are all weird. We are all different, special in our own unique ways, just like we all have different challenges to face. Often times we have exactly what we need within us to overcome the challenges life has placed in our way, yet we fail to realize this. We fail because we can’t see the light at the end of the tunnel, we see only misery and injustice, we wonder why we struggle, why us, why not someone else. We wonder how we can move forward with our deepest dreams if we are stuck in these everyday struggles, if we seem to be paralyzed by the smallest of inconveniences. We wish we could be rid of all challenges, and then everything would be perfect, we would be free to make our vision a reality. We see all sorts of people living seemingly happy lives, and we wonder why that can’t be us. We fail to realize that our life is our own life, our struggles are our own, we have the solutions to our own problems within us, and we will find our own peace once we have done what we need to do, once we have understood the truth about why we are suffering, once we have accepted ourselves with all our flaws and imperfections, all the mistakes we’ve made in the past, and all that we wish we already were but still haven’t become. We still have time to grow, but only if we learn from our mistakes, if we accept and forgive all that we are and have been; only then can we truly move forward in peace, to find real growth at the other end.

If we don’t accept ourselves as we are, if we don’t fully forgive ourselves for our past mistakes, then we lose the power we would otherwise have over the challenges we face. We start trying to copy others, to look at what others are doing in order to try to find some relief, some sense of belonging, of understanding and satisfaction, of feeling like we’re part of a bigger whole. What we really need to be doing is owning our challenges and our struggles, and looking within, with the conviction that we are sure to find the tools we need in order to overcome the current challenge as well as any other that life may throw at us. We need to understand that we are enough, that the power of life is flowing in our veins, in our breath, all of this keeps that us alive; it is not our decision to be alive at this moment, it is a gift, and it isn’t forever, as we all know. So let’s fully own our lives and see what comes of it. Just like we love to celebrate when things go right, we need to learn how to learn from our mistakes, how to learn from the pain and sorrow that may come from those mistakes, and how to learn from life even when our pain isn’t justified. We need to learn how to not grow bitter and cold when life doesn’t go our way. Life can be crazy and cruel, I know, and for a long time I was complaining about life’s injustices all the time, about the system, to everyone around me, until I realized that it does nothing more than create more negative energy. Negative energy messes with the complainer as well as with all those around them, not to mention how everything is energy, even the words we speak never die, whether positive or negative. We are what we focus on.

So focus on you. Focus on truly being yourself, to the best of your ability, on being all you can be, on shining a light of positivity however small you may feel it is. Embrace your weirdness, if you wanna call it that, and shine your light in whatever way you can. At the end of the day, we’re all weird, and at the same time we’re not. See, being weird would imply different from the rest, different than normal. What really is normal though? We’re all weird to someone (and they’re probably weird to us), to whole groups of people even, so in truth we’re all weird. Although, if we’re all weird then it isn’t so weird to be weird after all, I guess.