Our good memories in life are only good in the light of bad memories. Similarly, our happy times are only happy because of sad times. You cannot have one without the other, just how light does not exist, except when juxtaposed to darkness.
As much as points in our life can cause us to carry negative emotions and pain with us long after the event has subsided, the low points should hold just as important a place as the high ones. Why? Because without knowing bad, we can’t know good. Good becomes the new normal, and great becomes the new good. We are always in need of something to compare to.
The fact of our own mortality is probably one reason that many people try to block out their bad experiences – people don’t want to feel like they lost, that they drew the short straw in the game of life. People want to feel victorious and accomplished, and that the weight of the world was not too much as to crush them.
Yet in the end, we either all win or we all lose. Losing all material possessions, even the flesh that we inhabit, even our memories will fade in time as new life takes our place. Everyone finishes this game with the same end screen. Whatever was accomplished in one’s time on this earth holds no more worth than the day that it began. Some will have played the game with more enthusiasm, and some will have played a game that was cut short. In the end, everyone finishes the game.
Working from the end backwards, the most natural course of action is to let go and experience the full ride of life. The highs, the lows, the joy, the sorrow. All of it inherently part of the human experience.
“You danced, you drank
You laughed, you cried
You went to work
And said goodbye
I lived, I learnt
Stayed up all night
I’ll see you when
The time is right again.”