Curve Balls, Fish and Straight Balls

Life throws us curve balls.

We know they are coming but we don't know when. Mine came recently. In retrospect, I did see it coming, but I guess I just didn't want to believe it could happen. But it has and that damn curve ball has hit me right in the face. It hurts like nothing has ever before.

I suppose I expected life to only pitch straight balls. It was a nice dream, but some dreams are meant to remain dreams.

I fought the curve ball concept for a while by refusing to accept what was happening to me. I questioned a lot of things and hated my new and unwanted phase in life. Simply put, I wanted to shoot life right between its eyes.

However, I spoke to a dear friend recently and he asked me this: Have you ever seen fishermen catching fish? 

Yes.

When they cast their net, he said, and fish are trapped in it, notice how there are some fish that try to escape by wriggling and frantically moving? The problem is the more they do this, the more they get caught in the net. But if they keep still, then their body would just slip through the net, freeing them.

As he uttered his last word, a light bulb went off inside my head- or should I say turned on. The more time I spent questioning my life, wondering why I am where I am, I became the frantic fish. I've been kicking and screaming since this whole thing happened to me and it hasn't helped me one bit. The more I resisted, the deeper I became entangled in sadness.

That very day I decided  that I wanted out of sadness's net. This was only possible if I choose to become still, which meant that it was high time to accept things the way they really are. I needed to take a deep breath and say: It has happened, it is happening. Though it hurts, it is where I am now.

And as I looked around at this "now" phase I am in, I realized that it's not as horrible as it seems. Why? Because "now" is how I make it to be. I can always choose to see the beauty in life instead of focusing on the sadness.

Acceptance isn't the bat you missed the curve ball with, but the mindset that there will be other straight balls you can hit.