The Pieces of You and Me

Perfect Execution

I wander in my thoughts

to the pieces of the pieces of who I am,

to the ancestors who lived and loved and scattered their seeds in time,

before me,

to those far reaching and unique stories that are the foundation and the building blocks of who I am.

I ponder the passed down stories I've heard,

the memories I can recall,

the ones I can only intuit from faded pictures,

and the ones I cannot or subconsciously choose not to remember.

I think of my parents, my friend's parents, and all of the teachers, coaches, and other adults who have influenced me, held me, lifted me, and guided me.

I think of the words that have inspired me,

the friends that have impacted me,

and the relationships and losses that have temporarily crumbled me.

I contemplate the missed turns and the perfectly timed chance happenings,

the close calls and the joyous occurrences,

the mistakes that led to heartache and growth,

the choices and decisions that led me to where I was next meant to be,

and the signs -some missed, many seen- that make up the roadmap of my life.

I weigh the price of my regrets against the eventual wisdom of their lessons,

the price of my anger and guilt against the freedom that ultimately came from forgiveness,

and the price of resentment against the final choices I made to let them go with love.

I think of the births and the deaths,

the joys and the sorrows,

the celebrations and the accidents,

the worries and the fears,

and the subsequent calm from finally handing over to God my most debilitating moments.

And I realize how amazing all of it is,

how amazing all of us are.

We are so many pieces of so many others,

and so many pieces of life experiences and interactions,

of nature and nurture,

of seeming happenstance and choice's consequence's,

of the time that just keeps on making us into more of who we are.

We are pieces of pieces of good and bad,

of hard and easy,

of light and dark,

of hope and despair,

of joy and grief,

of so much love.

And all of it is a marvel.

All of it is miraculous.

And all of it is to be cherished.

Take a deep dive inside yourself,

swim in the beauty of all the pieces of your life,

be grateful for every person and every experience that has had a hand in helping to form who you are.

See if you don't come to the same conclusion:

There is no one else quite like you!

You are, quite simply, a wondrous and unique being.

You are, by pure deductive reasoning, nothing short of extraordinary.

You are a gift in every sense of the word.

You are the ongoing snippets and pieces and culmination of never-ending time and a never ending story.

Nothing is a mistake,

not you, not me,

not our shared and separate pieces,

not our encounters and experiences.

It is all part of discovering,

of becoming more.

Swim in gratitude for all you are,

for all you are still to be,

for all you have yet to learn,

for all the remarkable snippets of you that have and will forevermore influence the stories of others.

©Chris Colyer

Feb.16th, 2021