Here's To 2018

" heres to the moments when we didnt think about right or wrong, where we just lived, crossed our fingers and hoped for the best "

- visualstatments.net

New Years Day. The day of that marks the beginning of the "new you". A day that marks the beginning of your New Year's resolution to better yourself, your environment, and your overall lifestyle. We make lists and dream about how the year will be better with us doing these things and yet a week later we're found sitting on the sofa with a bag of chips in our laps binge watching a show we've seen four times to date. All for what? A reassurance you'll get to it tomorrow? Next week? Next month or even next year?

Nobody follows through with their New Year's resolution. I barely keep up with update days let alone a resolution to get up early and start running with my dog. We collectively make these promises to ourselves with no intent to follow through and then expect to be a changed person by the end of the year. 

Nobody will be the same person at the end of the year. Nobody will leave this new year the same either. We, as humans, learn and as we learn we grow, and as we grow, we become different people. It's our job, right now, it find the source of our unhappiness in the past year and to smother it. It's now our job to cut out the toxic people, the problems they bring, and the trouble and leave it in the past. It's now time to learn from our mistakes, and to learn from our failures as failure is the greatest teacher. We learned not to make those mistakes and to do things differently and now we head into the new year with a new outlook and a fresh mind.   

Now, I challenge you reader, to make a daily, a weekly, and even a monthly resolution to yourself. No matter the size of it, I challenge you to make the task and to complete the task. Start by making your bed in the morning. Start by getting up earlier and going to sleep earlier. Start by adding more greens to your plate than meats. Start going on crazy adventures and start trying new things. Read books you like and those you don't. Eat the food you thought smelled funny but never tried or try a food you hated as a kid. Listen to new music and old music. Start somewhere, start small, and you'll be inclined to do much more than just a simple task. Start somewhere and be amazed by the change. 

So here's to 2018, the year the resolution changes. The year we become better people, lead better lives, and better the world we live in. 2018 will be the year that all the bullshit will be left in and the year become the people we are meant to be in due time. 

here's to 2018

here's to us

here's to the year of better 

Until We Perish,

Shads

We are happy.

" one day happiness will find you "

unknown

Perhaps it's early in the morning on a Tuesday. The birds have started their day with a song. The sun shines through the gaps of the trees and slightly begins to illuminate the bedroom in which you share with someone you love. Let it be a pet, a person, or both for that matter. No one is awake but you. Your mind wonders before you take a deep breathe and smile widely. You're content. You're safe. You're happy. 

Or maybe you're in the old beaten up car that you can no longer tell if it was once red or if it was pink all along. The radio blares music played by the local radio station. The windows are rolled down and the crisp mountain air fills the car. You've taken a wrong turn but continued on anyway as towns passed by and you find yourself in a new place. You don't mind because you have all that you need in the car with you. You're content. You're safe. You're happy. 

It could even be a sudden moment in the middle of a concert crowd. You're listening to a band you've never heard of but they're pretty gosh-darn good. You're jumping around to the beat. Smiling and laughing. It was in that moment that you knew you were happy.

Happiness will find you. It will find you over and over and over again. Happiness was never a foreign concept for any of us. We will always have moments of defeat and failure, sadness and grief. Emotions are just a part of human life and it's okay to feel them but know that while we won't be happy forever we will have moments of pure euphoria we never want to end. We will also have moments of overwhelming sadness that it seems like everything good in the world is gone. Mother Earth has so much to offer to us its mind boggling. You just have to get out there to experience it. 

Go forth and adventure. 

Until We Perish, Shads