#410 – How do you keep your peace when the future looks bleak?

The thing you wanted is finally here and you get to see the bleakness of what's ahead of you. Now what?

My son came home yesterday and we all faced the very hard and winding path ahead of us––mostly him, but you know what happens when your only child enters jail two months before turning 20.

Many months of weekly reporting at the Community Control office, 13 miles from where we live, without a car. Former employer refusing to take him back and uncertainty about what employers might be amenable to hiring him. Potential hurdles to get a drivers license.

So, yes, now what? How can a mother accept all this? How can she prevent her Ego from berating her for having raised a child in such a way that this is happening?

How can she handle the Ghosts in her head telling her reality should be different?

You shouldn't have moved to this country. He should be more responsible. The justice system should be fairer. Re-entry programs should be more supportive. Society should be more tolerant.

Of course, this mother knows the answer––she writes about it every day. But one thing is to know, and a different thing is to embody it.

The answer is to live moment by moment––that's all I have.

Go back to basics: meditate, breathe, run, write. Be. Every minute, because I don't know what the next one will bring. And in each moment, things aren't bleak or bright. They just are.

What changes when you stop forecasting bleakness ahead of you and see the present instead?

Love,

Carolina