25
At the cusp of every birthday, there is the sight of everything behind you, and the prospect of everything ahead. A day you may never forget each year it comes, or a day wiped entirely from memory if the right amount of alcohol is applied.
I cannot speak for everyone on how they view their annual celebration of their genesis, but for me it has changed from a simple anniversary to a moment of reflection. Yet when the dust of the party finally clears, before the next day becomes just an ordinary one, there may be a moment where you look back on your life with some bittersweetness that hangs on your tongue. Memories, achievements, hardships, grief, joy, all roll back to you like ripples in a lake. A lake that stretches infinitely.
For me, as I turn 25, I feel that lake has never been clearer. My moment of reflection on my life, has never been more profound.
The water lies still as I walk on it, and the time I’ve spent alive doesn’t feel so much like a straight line. Everything I am, everything I have been and everything I may be, is all within my head and my heart like one big simultaneous lump of oneness.
My first day of school now stands side by side with the day I left it forever.
The day my Mum and Dad first held me, seems no further away from when I last hugged them hours ago.
My tears of tantrum at five, are now like the tears of adult heartache that roll down the same cheek.
Drawings and stories that I tore up with little hands now seem no different in causation to the art that bigger hands create and protect with paternal instinct.
I meditate on this, my heart bleeding with history. Bleeding with a life, a human life, that has never existed before. Nor will it ever again.
Everything has changed in such a small amount of years. Small to most. Yet it feels that still, some of it has never changed at all.
My life has changed, my path has changed. Many times in fact. For better or worse.
Yet despite all of that, the highs and lows, the ups and downs. The glorious triumphs to the utter failures. Even though it seems that the boy no longer exists. Even though the boy, and the man he’s become, look like two people…
I cannot help but feel that me, myself and I, have adapted, improved and survived through much, and yet altogether… I remain the same.
A better same, a greater same.
I am still that boy. The dreams just got bigger, and the possibilities numerous.
Perhaps I should wait another 25 years before my life has just enough to squeeze into a digestible biography, but if there are things I want people to gleam from this life I have lived, let it be these.
Never compromise who you truly are, inside. Not yourself, not your emotions, not your principles.
Sacrifices and compromises can be good, but not ones that rob you of your integrity, your sense of self, or your own happiness. We may have to do things beyond our comfort zone, or do things we simply don’t want to do. But the greatest things in this life are the fruit of our labour, the rewards when we grow by stepping beyond that zone of safety and comfort.
Never walk this earth with a face that isn’t yours, lest it stick there forever. Never look back wondering “what if.”
I have so much more to say in so little time, but most importantly, remember this if nothing else. If you don’t know who you are in this life, or what you want out of this life.
Then go out and find it, no matter what.
But it’s not a sprint, or even a marathon. But a hike, a tramp, over the hills and valleys of this life you lead.
To all those close to me, or even those who simply know me, I hope you join in that journey with me.
Just don’t forget to enjoy the view once in a while. Take it all in.
Kia Kaha. Ka kite.
Safe journeys.
Daniel
