We don’t win our depth and our inner form and our texture and our truth without the fire. Ordeal by fire.*
M. C. Richards

Apply yourself to thinking through difficulties – hard times can be softened, tight squeezes widened, and heavy loads made lighter for those who can apply the right pressure.**
Seneca

Not the path you saw yourself walking? –
There are limitations to our lives that come with being who and where we are,
Restrictions within and without,
But that’s not the end of the matter,
We still have a mighty lot of choice,
Having within us unique ways of applying pressure
as only we can;
Identifying and valuing and developing just what these are
changes everything:
Learning creates possibility.
Once we learn to see how the world works,
we can show up to make things better^ –
It may even be the path you did’t want to be on
is exactly the one you delight in.

*M. C. Richards’ Centering;
**Ryan Holiday’s The Daily Stoic;
^Seth Godin’s blog: Learning in August.