My Life Is One Step At A Time

That gloomy day many years ago when I thought my life was over–the sense of leaving the world was so intense which left me hopeless and defeated–and yet I wanted to live so much. I was very tired to keep on living. Life was no longer that exciting as a kid.

For ten years in the presence of a dysfunctional family was just mentally and physically draining. It pumped out my whole being. It dried up my soul. “I’m ready to die.” I told myself although the fear of dying was in a constant protest. I was eleven.

I had nowhere to go–not even my own family was there to embrace me. I hated my father, my siblings, my friends, my teachers, and everyone in the community. I couldn’t go to school. I had no food to eat. The worst I had no place to live.

Actually, it was no war or a fatal accident to struggle, but my heart and mind knew I was in a battle that never seen. I remember begged God on bended knee for strength to exist further because loneliness and poverty were just too much to bear–they engulfed my will to survive.

That is why I’m still here and always thankful for that victory.

Of course that was only one of the many excruciating pains I had been through. And for every end of the road I trod, for every circumstance had like at the end of one’s rope, it prepared me to be stronger like a real fighter. But it didn’t mean it spared me from crying, losing, praying like I never did, breakdowns, and even from tantrums–it was just part of climbing a huge mountain one step at a time.

Whether I meant literal darkness or only a symbol of suffering being experienced–each required grace and mercy to grasp–and only one step at a time is what required of me to give a good fight. I always asked the Father from above to win it for me. It’s my secret now.

But many times I wrestled alone, the more I did it solo fight, the more I failed, and the longer I suffered. Before I knew it, I was in an unwanted cycle of life. That’s when I gave up and go back in the loving arms of my Creator.

Funny to think, but it was in this seemingly slow-paced reality or way of life I had come to learn the meaning of loving, forgiving, understanding, waiting, persevering, and helping one another. Cést la vie! And each lesson per se wasn’t easy to learn.     

Has life given me a break yet?

It has compared to my past life, but I realized there is no such thing as shortcut to how a triumph is gained for all those fights and plights–at least for me. And so my existence is lived or played or acted one step at a time.