Blah. Today has been–a day. Nothing fabulous has happened, nothing terrible has happened. This afternoon I exercised, watched four thirty-minute videos about pain, fascia, and healing, and packed up my stuff at my latest house sitting gig and came home. I took a nap. When I woke up I tried some foam rolling techniques the videos I watched suggested. I think they helped, but who knows? The healing journey can be so frustrating–trying a million different things, making a little progress here, a little progress there. Still, along The Way we learn.

For years I’ve imagined that if I ever found The Thing that worked in terms of healing, I’d shout it from the rooftops. Alas, whereas I’ve found several things that have been helpful, I’ve never found The Thing. I imagine this is because The Thing doesn’t exist. That is, what’s helpful for one person may not be helpful for another, and life doesn’t offer us panaceas. Rude, I know. Still, the silver lining is that panaceas don’t seem to required. The videos I watched this afternoon, which really were fabulous, promoted a program that costs between $500 and $900. Ugh. At that cost, who can AFFORD to heal? Thankfully, healing isn’t a lock that can only be opened by one key. At least in my experience, there’s more than one way to heal, more than one way to skin a cat.

Meow.

Lately one of my mental challenges has been trusting my path and not comparing it to someone else’s. I imagine comparison has always been a thing on planet earth, but what with social media and all, it seems to be an even bigger thing now. Unfortunately, comparing ourselves to others isn’t limited to the areas of looks and talents. Oh no, we even compare our mental, emotional, and physical well being against that of others. We think, They’re pain free, they have more peace than I do, they’re BETTER than I am. And then guess what? Whether or not those things are true (and how could you ever know that?), we’ve made ourselves inferior. We picture ourselves failures for, I don’t know, having a blah day or a pain in our back, even though we’re anything but.

Recently I read that everyone is on a different path and that sure, perhaps we all came from and are going to the same place eventually, but everything in between is a totally individual journey. As such, we each come to the the planet with a different set of looks, skills, challenges, and set of circumstances that is “right” for us and for us alone. Seen from this perspective, comparing ourselves is pointless. Why does someone else have a smaller nose, more money, and a better singing voice than you do? Because they need it for their journey. You don’t. Why are you better at math, decorating houses, and listening (it’s a skill) than someone else is? Because that’s what your path requires. Theirs doesn’t.

This is what I mean by trusting my path. It’s so easy for me to think that I need to be smarter, wiser, healthier in order to “succeed” or get to wherever I’m going–because people who are already “there” seem to be these things. Of course, this is an illusion, one I’m working on dispelling. I’m working on coming around to the idea that life fills your journey’s backpack with whatever it is you need, when you need it. I’m coming around to the idea that if I don’t yet have something, it’s not necessarily that life is keeping something from me, but rather that it’s not best for me, or best for me right now. This is difficult to do, to not only accept what comes along, but also to want what you have, to look in you journey’s backpack and say, “Okay, this is what I have to work with, and I’m going to make the best of it. I’m going to find My Way. I’m going to trust that this is enough, that I’m enough, to get me back home.”