Notes on Regaining Autonomy II // Loss and Loneliness

Boshemia staff Elisha writes from her very core in the second installment of "Notes on Regaining Autonomy".

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The passing of time is a strange and powerful entity.

The proverbial saying is that time heals all wounds.

But what time masterfully produces in equal part,

Is the culling of experiences:

A “collected works” comprised of joy, struggle, learning, love, and loss.

Remember that this is the way of the world,

That seasons change,

And people drift from monumental roles in your life;

Sometimes ebbing into smaller ones,

Sometimes drifting on entirely,

Sometimes plucked away like leaves in Autumn;

Morphing into nothing more than memories: time-stamped echoes

Which may whisper over your shoulder in unexpected moments,

Rendering you simultaneously, sentimental and somber.

“Remember me?”

“How could I forget?”

Know that loss is complex notion which encompasses a multiplicity of circumstances;

That some are chosen, some by you, some by others,

And those which are not chosen,

May always speak the loudest,

In quiet moments spent, perplexed over the passage of time.

Realise that, loneliness is like a piece of music composed in some archaic fashion.

It is as beautiful as it is perplexing: a proliferated companion piece to Loss.

It coaxes out unabashed and unfamiliar feeling,

And in that moment,

You feel a unity with all others who have experienced it.

And there are others.

Remember that.

There are others.

Recognise, that even in loneliness, though you may be solitary,

You are never truly alone.

Even in loneliness, there is, indeed, the unanimity of all others who have come before you

And will come after you,

And feel as you have felt.

Take a moment to reflect, on the ambiguous beauty of solitary life.

To live alone is to face fear with broad-shouldered, stouthearted, tenacity.

It is at times laborious, arduous, enervating,

But in its lassitude, it brings the gift of reflection and reconstruction.

Recognise, further, that grief is a wheel, as is life;

That experience is not, simply, a linear set of occurrences that are happening to you.

It is an immersive environment in which you have the power to choose how you respond.

Remember that with every, seemingly, unassailable, challenge you are faced

There was an equally unassailable one which came before,

Over which you prevailed.

And you will again.

Because adaptation is one of the key qualifications of life

And as the culling of your human experience unfolds,

As everything seems to be falling apart,

And your environment becomes more complex,

Emergent properties reveal themselves.

You are an entity greater than the sum of all your parts.

Your life does not define you.

Your response defines your life.

And one day,

You will look back in your resilience, at your healed wounds, your grief, your struggle,

And take comfort in knowing that you will continue to grow,

To adapt,

To evolve,

To persevere.

And nobody can ever take that profoundly beautiful concept away from you.