Loving each other through it

There is no other way

There’s no handbook.
I promise you there isn’t.
It’s not on the self-help shelf in the bookshop.
You won’t even find it in Philosophy.
There’s no singular book, essay or guide that can do it.
Nothing that tells us how to be here.
Because, we can’t be told.

We are only ever shown.
We only ever know what to make of ourselves from experiencing ourselves.
We can only ever taste all the tastes of our humanness by being in it.
We won’t know what’s coming.
Only what has been.
We can’t guess what will happen next.
We only see what we can see.

No-one can prepare you for the grief you will face.
No estimations of the joy that will melt you back to wholeness.
You won’t believe how much pain the human heart can hold.
No best guesses at the bliss you’ll feel from running to catch the sunset.
They won’t tell you about the jars of tears that you might fill in this lifetime.
How absolutely, unbearably delicious this life is.
You can’t comprehend the wisdom you’ll gain from lying under trees.
The smiles you’ll witness that’ll heal wounds you never knew you had.

There’s no handbook on how to do life.
Even though there’s millions of books on it.
Because you can’t sell a book with only one word in it.
The word is love.

Not just the romantic kind.
Not just for friends.
Not just for last name-sharers.
Not just for people you know.

Love in its fullness.
Love that knows no names.
Love that spreads its tentacles across the globe.
Love that is limitless in its expression.

Love that reminds us of who we are.

The kind of love that reminds us why we’re here.
Yes, we’re here to grow.
We’re here to do things and be things.
We’re here to experience.
Feel pain, laugh loudly, swim, kiss and scream.
All of it.

Most of all, we’re here to love.
To love each other through all that is.
This life is pain and peace.
Cruelty and joy.
Grief and magic.
Love and loss.
The crushing beauty that is our existence.

We think we want it without its bad bits, but we don’t.
For, how else would we then know what is good?
Our hurts are proof of our joys. They are simply the absence of them.

All we must do is love each other through it.
We can’t control anything.
We can’t carry it all.
But, we have each other.

8 billion of us experiencing the same but different.
Oh, how the world would change if we loved each other through it.
Said more hello’s.
Held more hands.
Listened to voices that don’t sound like ours.
Checked-in. Released judgement. Gained more compassion.

Walked through streets with eyes of understanding.
Seeing ourselves in another.
You feel what I feel.
Eat and sleep like I do.
You too are straddling between sorrow and sweetness.

You too.
You too.
You too.

Isn’t that all there is?
A reminder of what it means to be human.
A two-worded love letter.
An invitation.

All we must do is love each other through it.
Maybe that’s all we can do.
Because, after all…
You too.