Finding motivation and inspiration in life is a challenge. We go through phases in our life where we feel stuck. We feel stuck in one place and don’t know how to take that step forward. That feeling of feeling stuck can last for a very short time, or a very long time. Unfortunately, sometimes that spark in us ignites once again after a tragedy takes place. It doesn’t even necessarily have to be a tragedy that involves you or people close to you. It would be something we see or sometime we read on the Internet. This occurs more often than one would think because during times of tragedy, we become more “woke.” In this time we are feeling our lowest of lows, and we are looking for a way out, a way to escape of this feeling. In this time, we look to be the best people we can be. We become more aware of how fragile life is, and how none of us are guaranteed another day on this Earth. We begin to grow this fire from underneath us, lifting us and inspiring us to follow a passion, to live life to the fullest. Tragedy reminds us that we are always so VULNERABLE.

I came to this realization about 2 weeks ago. I read that someone that I knew had passed away from a tragic ATV accident. Now I was not best friends with this person, I wasn’t even friends with this person, but I did know of him. We had met once or twice years ago when we were both in high school. We knew each other through mutual friends, and we spoke very little to each other. Even with minimum communication, I always remembered him. I remembered him from the times I had seen him in person. He always was smiling. He was always loud. He was always laughing. He was just so friendly and his personality shined through. I always thought he was very sweet. In life, you meet people like that. You meet them, and move on. Years went by, and I was figuring out my life, changing my group of friends, and deleting and creating new social media, I never saw him again in person or online. I didn’t think about it. I just figured he would continue to live his life doing whatever he did, graduate school, find a girl, get married, have kids, etc. What the average human does throughout his/her life. To find out through Facebook he passed away at only 23/24 years old made my heart drop. I saw his name and I immediately remembered who he was. It was crazy that have 7 years of never seeing him, I remembered who he was so quickly. Such a big personality, had a future, and it was taken away. He had so much going for him.

But in that moment, I realized: this could happen to me. This could happen to one of my best friends. This could happen to a family friend. A tragedy could happen to ANYONE. And in that moment, I realized…. I need to stop holding back. I need to stop saying “I’ll do it tomorrow.” I realized that if I want something, I gotta go for it and never look back and second guess myself. I want to live my life to the absolute fullest. I want to show my gratitude towards whatever force or spirit is allowing me to stay alive another day.

Everyone has different passions and different goals in life. But all of them are able to be accomplished. But we have to realize that in order to accomplish or dreams and goals,we have to get out of our comfort zone. We have to accept that we are vulnerable. We have to embrace our imperfections and embrace the good and bad that comes into our lives. We need to feel free. A flower can’t grow in a dark little box. It can only grow where there is sun and space for growth. We can’t let the dark box we call doubts hold us back from following what we WANT. We have to break through that box and put our face up to the sun and LIVE.