Face your life, its pain, its pleasure. Leave no path untaken. --Neil Gaiman
It is said that we must experience the so-called negative emotions of anger, fear, anxiety, etc. in order to appreciate the so-called positive emotions of love, joy, happiness, etc. I find this to be true. There is significance in the contrast. It all leads to a fuller, richer life experience.
While I feel like I have done a lot of challenging things in my life, nothing tops the pair of child-rearing and marriage. Both have offered pain and pleasure in spades. Ultimately pleasure certainly wins in my case, but as anyone who has raised kids or been married knows, there are rough spots along the way. I can happily say that we have two wonderful adult sons, and today my husband and I celebrate 34 years of marriage.
I can easily say that my greatest anger, rage even, has been toward those three males. I can also easily say that there is no one ever that I love more than those three. We have traveled many paths together, and I don't regret a minute of it, pain or pleasure. For this, I am eternally grateful. "Wife" and "mother" have been my two most rewarding roles in this lifetime.
It is a rather unfortunate trait of human behavior that we rarely make changes when we are experiencing pleasure. It is usually pain, and plenty of it, that causes us to make worthwhile adjustments in our lives. So be it. All paths taken have their rewards, if we are open to seeing them.
Life goes on, a fact that we celebrate this day, Easter Sunday.
Rejoicing,
Leta
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