A Life of Color
Life is full of color. Reds, greens, blues, purples, pinks, oranges, yellows and more. Life is vibrant, beautiful, and filled with joy. Life is also harsh, cruel, and spiteful. It is inescapable, each color represents a duality, happiness, sadness, tall, short, high, low, etc. Some learn to embrace this, to accept that a life filled with color, is a life worth living. And yet with all of these colors, with the full vibrancy and depth of life, one cannot escape from pain.
One day, dear reader, life’s red may cause you great pain. What would happen, if you decided to run from that pain? Eventually, you would find that you had escaped red altogether. To escape that great pain, you removed an entire color from your world. The vibrancy is diminished. The spectrum of experience is limited. An entire part of life itself removed for the sake of that escape. At least you still have the other colors right?
Soon, blue causes you pain even greater than red did. Again, you run from blue, to escape the pain. Soon, life is missing both blue and red. Then another color causes you pain. Another. Another. Soon, to avoid all pain, all color has been removed from life. Life then has no vibrancy, no depth of experience, nothing to make it worthwhile. In this state, life has become flat, grayscale, everything blends into the background, just another shade of gray.
Before you know it, you begin to contemplate, why do I bother? Life has lost all of its color, all of its vibrancy, all of its depth. Why even, is this a worthwhile way to live? So you look death, straight into the eyes. You contemplate the black abyss. Your soul begins to be consumed by the deep black abyss, and you begin to walk into it. Suddenly, a thought appears… Would I be staring into the abyss if I had a life of color again? If life had its vibrancy, its depth, all of the experiences, good and bad, would I not want to continue?
Then the critical matter is at hand. To live a life of color, you have to accept the full depth of the experiences. The good and bad, the easy and the hard. You know it is worth it though. You know the pain of red, is more bearable than the black abyss. You know the pain of blue is more bearable than the black abyss. Anything is better than that darkest place.
Suddenly, life returns to color, and with it, all the pain that had been suppressed. The pain accrued interest in the intervening time, and is now even larger than before. The pain threatens to overwhelm, it seems too much, and yet, the black abyss is gone. The pain does not diminish the vibrancy, the depth, and the meaning of life. Some call this period, into the abyss and back again, a dark night of the soul. Yet, because color has returned to life, life regains its meaning again. It becomes worth living again. The black abyss subsides, and more years of life in this human experience are able to continue.
As the life of color is lived, pain comes and goes. So too does the opposites of pain, all those good things which too come and go. Yet the pain, experienced this way is less. There is no need to allow it to accrue interest anymore. The pain is, just what it is. It can be accepted, just as all good things are accepted. Doing this, living in acceptance of what is, is to live a life of color. By refusing to run away from what is uncomfortable, you allow all the things that make life worth living to flow towards you. Life itself becomes worthwhile. Each moment can be appreciated for exactly what it is. Each experience can be enjoyed, not because it is necessarily good or bad, but because of the vibrancy and depth that it adds to your life.
Live a life of color. It won’t be easy, but it will be worth it.
PS:
If you are staring into that abyss, right now, know that you are not alone. Many have stood there before you, and many will stand there in the future. Know that right now is the only time that you have the choice to turn away. Each moment, each now, is the opportunity. To look at the light in the other direction, white in color, possessing all color. Know that there is always help to be found for those who ask for it. Never feel that you must suffer alone, never stare into the abyss so long that you cannot return.
That life of color, so full of vibrancy and depth, worthwhile and meaningful, is right there, waiting for you to claim it.
https://www.samhsa.gov/find-help/national-helpline or call 988 in a crisis.
