Bittersweet

My friend wrote this on her blog and I really enjoyed it...wanted to share.

The idea of bittersweet is changing the way I live, unraveling and re-weaving the way I understand life. Bittersweet is the idea that in all things there is both something broken and something beautiful, that there is a moment of lightness on even the darkest of nights, a shadow of hope in every heartbreak, and that rejoicing is no less rich even when it contains a splinter of sadness.

Bittersweet is the practice of believing that we really do need both the bitter and the sweet, and that a life of nothing but sweetness rots both your teeth and your soul. Bitter is what makes us strong, what forces us to push through, what helps us earn the lines on our faces and the calluses on our hands. Sweet is nice enough, but bittersweet is beautiful, nuanced, full of depth and complexity. Bittersweet is courageous, gutsy, audacious, earthy.

So this is the work I’m doing now, and the work I invite you into: when life is sweet, say thank you and celebrate. And when life is bitter, say thank you and grow.

To my people who are here (for whatever reason): stay here for a minute. Feel it, feel the bittersweet. Keep celebrating. Keep ugly crying. You won’t always ugly cry, I promise. When life is bittersweet, call it that. Name it. There is freedom in naming things. Surround yourself with people who can handle the bittersweet. The people who can love you during the bittersweet, I believe they will get a special crown in heaven. I do. Drop the people who can’t (for now). They’re the worst. The people who offer pity, silver linings, and sentences about God’s will and timing for your life? Smile, say a cuss in your head (if you’re into that), and let them go in one ear and out the other. And then have a glass of wine. Because they don’t have a clue. Sometimes life is really bitter. Sometimes life is really sweet. But sometimes it’s both. And that’s totally okay