When Life Knocks You on Your Ass

We all have those times when life either physically or metaphorically completely knocks us on our ass. Sometimes it comes in the form of circumstances, or events. Sometimes it comes in the form of a head splitting migraine that leaves you just barely functioning. Either way, you find yourself knocked down and feeling bad about yourself, about life, about everything.

For me at the moment, it is a very physical and literal, being knocked on my ass. I am currently writing this sitting in a darkened, totally silent room. Yesterday, for the first time in years, I got my ass kicked by a migraine that came (almost) out of nowhere. Over the past week or so I've been fighting off a slight headache. Part of me felt that this is where it was headed, I could feel it, but I had thought I did everything I could to prevent it.

Yesterday afternoon my body said, "Fuck you!" And I went down for the count. I crawled into bed at 2:30 yesterday afternoon and that is where I stayed until this morning. I was feeling pretty good when I got out of bed, but as the day as gone on, I feel myself fading more and more yet again.

I've had a lot of stress going on in my life recently. I've dealt with it and handled it the best I possibly could. Sometimes that's not enough. Sometimes my body, my life, still decides to tell me to take a seat. Generally when that happens, I end up not having much of a choice but to listen. I am the first to admit that I tend to run myself ragged until I'm forced to stop. I don't do that whole relaxing, taking time off, thing very well.

This often leads to my body, in an extra dramatic fashion of course, forcing me to take a break. It knocks me on my ass because it is the only way I will slow down and take some time. Life is that way too. Sometimes it knocks us down because there is something we need to see. There is something we need to learn, and it is only by being knocked down that we can look up and see it.

There is nothing wrong with falling down. There is nothing wrong with listening to your body when it knocks you down. Take the time. When life knocks you down, lay there for minute. Look up, and see what it is trying to tell you. Find the lesson it is trying to teach you. It doesn't matter if you get knocked down, what matters is that you get back up.

You have to get back up and you have to keep fighting. You have to take whatever lessons life is trying to teach you and use them, absorb them, and move forward. Take those times when you are knocked on your ass, and allow them to make your life better, to make you better. After all, that's what life is all about isn't it? The fight to do better, to be better.