All You Have is Yourself
12.10.24
Howdy everyone,
Welcome to December! Happy Holidays! Well here we are in the last 21 days of 2024. I don’t know about everyone else, but I feel like I stumbled into the last few weeks of 2024 instead of entering it gracefully, but hey what are you going to do? It is odd to think about the fact that the majority of my year has been spent in the land of Dolly Parton, moonshine, and the Las Vegas for Kids (Pigeon Forge). However, as I write this, I am currently on the road in Mississippi, singing at the top of my lungs to any song that comes across my radio, hurtling back home to East Texas. There is a taste of bitter sweetness of the past nine month season ending, but I am excitedly looking forward to what the next year will bring me.
I have purposefully hesitated in writing this post until I was able to let everyone know where I am headed next. If you know me, then it is no surprise that I have an unexplainable yearn in my soul to be up north. This may be due to the fact that I have spent my years in the South and the idea that there is a completely different climate and culture exists outside of sunbaked summers and incredibly temperate winters is so fascinating to me, with that being said I feel like I have won the northern jackpot with my next location. I am staying with the company that I worked with in Tennessee, but I am moving to their location in… Maine! I will be working next to Acadia National Park beginning in April. I am incredibly grateful for the opportunity this company has provided me to continue with them in one of the most coveted locations they have and to say that I am ecstatic is an understatement.
As the last few days spent in Tennessee wrapped up, I looked around with the same eyes that I had whenever entering Tennessee nine months before. I took the time to reflect on the past season and the people that have become a part of me and their impact on my mindset. The evening before my partner and I headed out to our last hurrah of Tennessee, we headed over to one of our friends house where he took the time to cook an amazing dinner for my partner and I. As we were sitting around the kitchen, enjoying the food, company, and reminiscing on our time spent here in this little slice of the country that brought forth so many memories and friendships, our friend became very serious and told us something that became very important to me that I have not stopped thinking about since. He is an older gentleman that has lived many lives, and he told us a story of when he was a young sprout of a boy. His grandfather was a true blood Native American of the Cherokee Nation and gave him this piece of advice before he passed on, and our friend then shared his grandfather's advice with us. At the ripe age of 5 his grandfather informed him, “Never walk with your head down. Always look up and stand tall. Be proud of what you have accomplished. And more importantly, be proud of what you are going to accomplish in this life”. This is an incredibly powerful statement in of itself, but the last sentence is what resonates deeply within me. It truly rattled me and has been echoing inside of my head since our friend took the time to share this poignant statement.
There are many different ways to interpret this piece of advice. The phrase that stands out to me the most is the last line, “Be proud of what you are going to accomplish in this life”. This line resonates with me for a specific reason, at first glance this can be taken as a sentiment to the idea that you are always going to be accomplishing something. That you are always pushing forward and you should look excitedly to the future at what you are going to achieve, which is great. I take this group of words differently. To me, this is a different perspective of the expression “At the end of the day, all you have is yourself”. Instead of putting emphasis on the words “be proud of what you are GOING TO ACCOMPLISH”, I find the emphasis in “be proud of what YOU are going to accomplish”. This to me is a call to action in your life. Instead of waiting for things to change and the opportunities to find you, create them. Make your own pride. Push the boundaries. Live in the uncomfortability, then push even further. At the end of the day, all you have is yourself. No one will be there to tell you “I am proud of you” instead have pride in yourself. Be unapologetic in the things you are passionate about, and create activism in them.
I feel like this is especially important at this time in our world. Things are changing all around us, depending on who you are as a human these may be things to rejoice or things to be fearful of. I am not here to start a conversation about politics or argue about which side is good or bad, I am simply stating that things are changing and different people have different opinions of them. Since we are in a time of change and every day seems to bring a whole slew of new issues rising to the surface, we as humans are presented with a choice. We can either be passive and silent, or we can stand up for what we believe is right. If we choose the latter option, we are opening ourselves to even more unease, but we would be living our truth. There are people who will have different opinions than you, there are people that will be disappointed, upset, even angered at your decision to not remain silent in your fervor of what you believe, but this is where you decide whether the awkwardness is worth it or not. Personally, I can understand the hesitation of not wanting to rock the boat or creating strife, but this way of life is simply watering yourself down to be more tolerable to those around you. And who wants to live like that?
I ask each of you, whose opinion matters more? everyone else’s? or your own? I myself do not want to go through my life curating myself to the version everyone around me wants to see. I hope in the future that I will grow towards not allowing fear to rule how I present myself and I hope the same for each of you.
Thank you for reading. And as always, I hope to see you out there.
N