as numbness is

Remember, as bad as numbness is,
as bad as the loss of your
fun, bright self -

who you love! maybe only just
realize it now?

- this loss is

for now.

It is temporary. It won't be
the end, Don't you let it
be

as bad as numbness is
Believe

it will not last forever. And nothing
does.
Stop

to think over how many times
you stood in this world
in dumb surprise, and loved
the moment you found yourself in,
that you never saw coming! Or if you did,
you never thought it would feel like it
does. It was you, then
loving it. You

who gave in

You, who will be there
to give in again. And where you will be,
and what you will bring will be nothing like you
could have even foreseen. Life

is full of these tricks, somehow.

Life
has so much more of you
in store for the world than you can see
now.

There are people you haven't even met
yet, people
you will be glad to meet. People
whose lives
- though they don't know it yet -
will be immeasurably impoverished, if you
aren't there to meet them, and the most important
out of all those people you'll want to meet, to know,
to love, to hate - at least, be very mad at - to touch,
to save,

to forgive, is you. We do not live

in a world without end, and that
is the saddest thing on earth. The end
will come for us all - too soon,
soon enough. Hang in
while you can, and see
what you can do with all of the hurt,
with the time that you'll have to give,
and with all of the love
you'll have to give. The life you save
may be your own, but it may be someone
you don't even know,
not yet. But hang in, and see
- not for anyone else. See

for yourself. Believe
in the person you're moving forward
to be.
Believe in that person being someone you'll want
to find out about, see
and see grow, to learn, to love and to live within,
to see how much there is to you
that you'd never guess you'll be

that the world could do without,
for sure, but poorer for it
as a world can be.

Believe there is future ahead of you
now: not knowable now, I know
But there are so many days, full years of them - and even if
now looks desolate, gray, the future holds more
than anything, and you

have the strength to hold
and hang in. Believe that you'll live
to see - more bad times,
true - but you'll also know, then
that you've been through worse. And
can get through worse. And you
will live
to see all of the times
when life is good, when you raise
your head above the clouds,
surprised, and laugh at where you are,
and with hope in where you are going
to, now - even as bad as numbness is.

You are going there, now. Believe in where
you are going to now, even if today
you journey upon a ship becalmed, going nowhere
fast. Let it be your pace, take a day of rest.

Who you are

is more than your personal best. Who you are
is more than your emotional state. More even
than the sum of all of your emotions.
Feelings rise and fall, but who you are
is deep and wide and far beyond that. It's every stand
you ever made, and every leap you ever took, and every
time you stopped, reached out, and took
what life was trying to give, or gave

yourself to it.

The self who you love,
and miss - the you
who you create
Is there, even if you can feel
all of it, or any of it
that you care to feel.

It endures, created
by choices and questions
and wants and needs, the things
in your care, the thing that you've held
important - even if

you can't muster up much
excitement for them, right now.
Even if the absence of that cuts
so deep,
you feel like yourself is gone,
and you can't feel a thing, and it feels
like hell. Cut yourself
a break, a space to breathe in
in this time of trial, try.

You're not going away. You are going through way
too much not to cut yourself a break,
for the sake
of the you
who feels lost, right now.

Deep breaths. The only thing

you have to get through today,
is today. Hold out. Hold
out for the you you were,
who is the you you are. Who
is the you you've made. And who is also
the you

you will be again.

Seek help, but know "thyself"

is more
than what feels missing, now.

You know and you feel so much is missing.
So much is gone that you can't feel the lack -
but you know what it was, you know

who you are.
Who you are today is part of that.
As long as you know what's missing now,

you'll be able to find the way back.