All real living hurts as well as fulfils. Happiness comes when we have lived and have a respite for sheer forgetting. Happiness, in the vulgar sense, is just a holiday experience. The life-long happiness lies in being used by life; hurt by life, driven and goaded by life, replenished and overjoyed with life, fighting for life’s sake. That is real happiness. In the undergoing, a large part of it is pain.
you don’t have to force a positive mindset on yourself 24/7. while it’s good to keep things like self love and self care in mind, it’s okay to let yourself feel sad or hurt over things. it’s okay to take time to grieve or reflect. your emotions are not your enemy and they don’t need to be suppressed constantly. remember it’s okay to feel.
Time is the substance I am made of. Time is a river which sweeps me along, but I am the river; it is a tiger which destroys me, but I am the tiger; it is a fire which consumes me, but I am the fire.
Jorge Luis Borges, Labyrinths: Selected Stories & Other Writings, 1962
