Live Free

Clayton's journey has changed me so.  My insides no longer match my outsides, I've aged both in ways people can see and in ways they can't and I have seen horrors of a certain kind to fill multiple lifetimes.  The effect this has had on me was both unforeseen and unexpected.  But it is one of the best things about this journey.

You see, I reached this point of exhaustion where I stopped caring about the wrong things and just wanted to live for the right things.  

I saw this quote from Meryl Streep a while back and saved it ever since.  In many ways it describes how I feel.  I know there are some people that have a hard time grasping this concept, but living this way works for some people...for many people...and its unimaginably freeing... Not only that, living this way is possible for anyone.  It's kind of like using the good china everyday because who the hell knows if they'll have tomorrow and you love that frickin' china or doing your bucket list now because you can and why the hell not.  It's freeing.  It's realizing that that person/people in your life who is always negative and critical...they aren't necessary...even if you love them, you don't have to give them a chance to drag you into their hole.  It's realizing appearances don't matter and a hypocrite is a hypocrite no matter how they disguise themselves.  And generally speaking you are under no obligation to buy into the bullshit our society tries to feed us by the boat load.  It's breaking free of anything and everything necessary to just be and just live all of your days on this beautiful gift of a planet our amazing God has put us on and filtering out all of the crap.  We all have a choice and I choose 110% to filter out all the things/people that stress me out or bring me down and that/who are generally just toxic.  

I have ONE life and it isn't guaranteed to be long.  I choose not to waste it on that which doesn't matter.