I Promise It Will Get Better

We have reached the stage of winter where crisis mode is setting in. Over the last few days I’ve had conversations with five different people about how hard everything is, which is a clear sign that everybody is struggling right now.

Here’s what I want you all to remember: it will get better. Spring will arrive eventually, and until it does grab your favourite dog/cat/human/pillow and get some extra cuddles in.

Don’t beat yourself up if you are not productive or don’t have energy or don’t feel like doing much. It’s okay. We’re hibernating. Nature is resting, and so can you.

It’s hard if you look around and it looks like everybody has it more or less together. Let me assure you: they don’t. You are surrounded by people who feel the way you do, and I think it’s a terrible thing that we don’t know that because everybody is hiding behind a mask, pretending to be strong.

Be brave and let someone peek behind the mask! Pull it away just a little bit and see what happens. Sharing our vulnerability doesn’t make us more vulnerable, it liberates us — hiding and pretending are a lot of work.

The first time I let someone look behind my mask, I shook with fear and cried from sheer terror, and then the most amazing thing happened. They told me, “Me, too.”

And the more I shared, the more I heard those powerful two little words, words that made all the difference because they told me that I was not alone.

I couldn’t believe how many of us are out there — so many more than you’d ever think possible.

It’s the happy ones and the strong ones and the quiet ones and the loud ones. The introverts and extroverts, the fit ones and the bookworms. It’s your boss and the intern, your big brother and your indestructible mother.

We all get beaten down. We all get weak and defeated. Some of us don’t know the darkness, but many of us do.

So why do we feel so alone?

Because we hide. We pretend and we only share the highlights and we hope that nobody will ever find out. And most people won’t, because we are so very good at pretending.

But it’s a lonely road to walk alone. It’s so much easier knowing that there are others on the same road, walking right alongside us.

And there are many of us on that road. We are all walking together.

Reach your hand out. Can you feel them? Can you feel us?

We are all right there beside you.