I Walk The Line

6/26/2006



As we tiptoe closer to the borderline of playing God, both as a nation and as individuals, we have to ask ourselves if we are trying too hard. Are we pushing too hard for something that we are not supposed to have, pushing the limits to get what we want, superceding what should be with what we want to be?

How do we know when to stop trying?

I’ve often said at the demise of a relationship, “it shouldn’t be this hard.” When I was younger it was, “nothing good comes without hard work.” Today, I’m not sure which I stand by.

As cloned sheep- genetic copies of healthy sheep- die for no reason, and kids with cancer live through bone marrow transplants and then die from an aneurysm in their twenties, we have to ask ourselves if this is God’s way of saying to back off. As we string our marriages through counseling, trying to scrape the bottom of the barrel to find something worth saving--only to be divorced in a year--are we just trying too hard? But on the same token, we don’t want to throw our hands up at every bump in the road. In the midst of quarrels, it is almost impossible to see what we should do.

I think perhaps we owe it to ourselves, our relationships, whatever- to do everything in our power to save whatever it is we’re trying to save. Otherwise, we will never know. If we do everything we possibly can, and we still fail, then we know it wasn’t meant to be. Do we waste time, energy, emotion? Of course. However, it becomes so hard to live with ourselves when we don’t know if we’ve tried hard enough.

When I gave up at the first sign of trouble in a relationship, I kept going back to the problem because I just couldn’t accept that one little thing could be a deal-breaker. I kept trying, and I gave him every ounce of everything in me. I was desperately caught between my two mantras. I had to eventually accept that I might lose everything if I kept trying to save it. And sure enough, I did lose everything. But today no one could ever accuse me of not trying hard enough to make it work.

If something is meant to fail, it will inevitably fail. If someone is meant to die, they will inevitably die. And if something is meant to be, it will be. When our number is up, it’s up. We can’t stop fate anymore than we can stop the sun from shining. Unfortunately, we don’t know fate and we can’t steal fate’s game book or infiltrate it. Therefore we must play on the offense. It is useless to defend against fate.

Looking back, I see the amount of time I wasted on relationships and people that ultimately didn’t matter. But I always gave them one hundred percent, simply because you never know who is going to end up as the most important person or what will end up being the most influential situation in your life. I’ve treated every relationship as one that could possibly turn into forever. I’ve treated every friendship like one that could last a lifetime. Yes, I’ve gotten hurt and I have been hung out to dry more times than I could count; however, I’ve also come to accept destiny for what it is. When things don’t work out my way, I don’t curse fate and yell, “I defy you, stars!” Rather, I accept that what is meant to be, will be… even though it may not be what I want it to be.