Through the Fog

Tag: life lessons

  • Wasted Time

    I used to think

    I wasted years.

    On the wrong people.

    The wrong choices.

    The wrong version

    of myself.

    I counted birthdays

    I barely remember.

    Conversations

    that led nowhere.

    Dreams

    I kept postponing

    until they forgot my name.

    I called it

    wasted time.

    But time

    doesn’t disappear.

    It leaves something behind.

    A scar

    that taught me

    where not to bleed.

    A goodbye

    that taught me

    what staying should feel like.

    A mistake

    I stopped repeating.

    Even the years

    I spent lost

    were years

    I learned the sound

    of my own footsteps.

    Would I take them back?

    Some days.

    Some days

    I’d erase entire chapters

    if I could.

    But then I’d lose

    the lessons,

    the strength,

    the quiet understanding

    that came only

    because I lived through them.

    Maybe time

    is only wasted

    if it leaves you unchanged.

    And I didn’t stay

    the same.

    I became someone

    who knows

    that healing

    takes longer

    than hurting.

    That leaving

    can be an act of love.

    That starting over

    isn’t failure—

    it’s faith.

    So maybe

    I didn’t waste my time.

    Maybe I spent it

    becoming someone

    I couldn’t have been

    any other way.

  • Somewhere After Rock Bottom

    I used to think

    rock bottom

    was a place.

    A single moment.

    A line in the sand

    where everything finally stopped getting worse.

    But I was wrong.

    Rock bottom moves.

    Every time I swore

    I couldn’t fall any farther,

    life found another floor.

    Another lesson.

    Another consequence.

    Another version of myself

    I didn’t recognize.

    And the strange thing is—

    I survived all of them.

    Every bottom

    I thought would bury me.

    Every night

    I thought would be the one

    that finally broke me.

    Every morning

    I didn’t want to face.

    I’m still here.

    Not unchanged.

    Not untouched.

    Not stronger

    in the inspirational way

    people like to talk about.

    Just… still here.

    A little more scarred.

    A little more honest.

    A little less convinced

    that pain is forever.

    Because I’ve learned something

    about darkness.

    It always feels endless

    when you’re standing in it.

    It always convinces you

    there’s nothing beyond it.

    And every single time—

    it’s lying.

    The sun comes up.

    The wound closes.

    The thing that felt impossible

    becomes a memory.

    Not a pleasant one.

    But a memory.

    So if I’m standing

    somewhere after rock bottom now,

    I think that’s enough.

    I don’t need to know

    where the road ends.

    I just need to know

    I’m no longer falling.

    And for today,

    that’s a good place to begin.

  • The Things That Stay

    Some things leave.

    People.

    Promises.

    Versions of yourself

    you thought would last forever.

    They slip away quietly,

    without asking permission,

    without caring

    how badly you wanted them to stay.

    I used to chase them.

    Used to run after endings

    like I could change their minds,

    like enough love,

    enough effort,

    enough pain

    could make something remain.

    But loss

    has never listened to bargaining.

    It takes what it takes.

    And eventually

    you get tired

    of chasing ghosts

    through doors

    that only open one way.

    So you stop.

    Not because it hurts less.

    Because you finally understand

    that some things

    aren’t meant to be carried forever.

    Still—

    not everything leaves.

    The lessons stay.

    The scars.

    The songs that remind you

    of who you were.

    The strength you never wanted

    but somehow earned.

    And maybe

    that’s the strange gift of surviving—

    realizing that while life

    takes more than its share,

    it leaves something behind too.

    A wiser heart.

    A deeper soul.

    A quieter understanding

    of what truly matters.

    So let the leaving happen.

    Let the endings end.

    Trust that what belongs to you

    isn’t always the thing that stays—

    sometimes it’s the person

    you become

    after it’s gone.