Article: Encouragement

Article & Photo by Johana Chavez

It’s easier to share someone else’s encouraging thoughts than to share my own and worry what others might think, perhaps my thoughts were too many or perhaps it’s too much to read or perhaps it’s not interesting enough. But friends, your lives are not meant to be some show of greatness and ease, you are allowed to mess up, we were not meant to struggle alone.

It’s okay if your social media feed doesn’t consist of the same tones, what is life if not colorful? It’s okay if you can’t think of some giant genius words to describe the places you’ve seen and thoughts you want to share, in simplicity we find honesty, and if we were all a little more honest I think maybe we’d realize we all feel alone sometimes and we all need to know we're loved and we all skip songs we used to like because we don’t want to go back to that place. Maybe we can come together and love each other like Jesus loves us and maybe we can be kind to those who don’t know they’re not alone and maybe we can share our struggles and face the giants together.

Maybe we can lay under the stars at night and marvel at the simple glories right beneath our noses, and maybe we can create art to brighten our rooms when it’s dark until all our lights join and earth is just one giant sphere of light. Honesty is not easy, it takes courage to let people know why you skipped that song and why you stopped writing, it’s painful being vulnerable, to visit old wounds for the chance of someone else’s healing. It’s scary sharing your soul without knowing what will be said or what will be thought of you. There will be people who thank you for it and there will be people who judge you for it, it’s just the way it goes. Sometimes you may see the difference you’ve made and sometimes you’ll be told but sometimes you won’t. Sometimes there will be someone who needed to hear what you had to say but you’ll never know how your words or actions graced them, but take heart, heaven knows. Maybe, if we’re brave, we can build from our brokenness together, holding each other in our moments of doubt, stirring one another to life.

We could write songs of our struggles and sing them from the roof tops for anyone hopelessly wandering in the streets below to know they do not struggle alone, then we could bring our lights together and hold them up for everyone to see, to see our hope. We could take their hands and guide them to our home and we could feed them and keep them warm and share our stories and photographs of the mountains we’ve climbed, of the giants we slayed, and of the oceans we’ve cried. We could give them hope, together. We could build each other up until “broken” is a state long forgotten. Together, amidst the tears of joy and of pain, amidst the bruises and shattered dreams, we can grow, despite all the pains, despite all the hopeless feelings. We can take each moment and learn from our falls, we can live a life of passion, of avidity.

But we must be together, we must be vulnerable, and we must love one another.