Rollercoasting

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This week has all felt a bit like a roller coaster…there have been great highs and real challenges…lovely moments and difficult decisions…victories and losses.  It’s hard at times like this to keep hold of the bigger picture indeed there have been times during the last seven days when I’ve felt like I was lurching from one critical incident to another and this always unnerves me as it’s a dangerous position to be in. 

Living in the moment like this means you lose sight of the journey you are on, the things you are learning on the way and the things that each step teaches you regardless of whether the current one goes in your favour.  At YTYT this week the casting for the two Shakespeare plays has either been done or is imminent…the coin has been flipped for which cast goes to Kendal and lots of drama school auditions and prep.  Of course there have been and will be disappointments, of course amongst the happy faces of those who have got what they want there are those that will feel like life has dealt them a severe blow.

It’s my instinct to want to protect you from all of that but I also know that by avoiding the risk of disappointment nothing would get done, nothing would happen…every single thing worth anything means taking a risk, means a chance of disappointment and if you live simply by the verdict…only take into account the moment of victory or defeat you’re missing a whole vista of life experience…

In every path, alternate course, shift in position there is something of value even if it’s not the one you wanted…there is an opportunity to experience something even if it’s not the vision you imagined…perhaps you get to observe from the outside rather than being in the central role…perhaps you get to explore something you hadn’t expected to experience…or inhabit a place or lifestyle you had never considered an option.  The important thing is to treasure each section of the journey and add them into the whole that makes you the best you possible…a resilient, hopeful, generous, empathetic individual that welcomes whatever challenge is next…

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