This song came on my playlist today. I paused when it did, to listen and to hold space with it. The first time I heard this song was in late 2019, and it brought me to my knees in tears. I hadn’t cried like that in years, but the lyrics in the song held words left unspoken; words of grief and honesty and hope and vulnerability.

I didn’t know it at the time, but it marked the start of a process that was long past due as I found myself facing Pandora’s box, its contents full of things unfelt and things left unaddressed. I was terrified of what existed within its recesses, but as the lyrics go in Incubus’s song, Echo, I understood “my biggest fear will be the rescue of me.”

I don’t believe in destiny. I don’t believe in a book prewritten that set me up to face the experiences I’ve had, or an immortal being responsible for writing the story of our lives. But I do believe that we all have choices in our lives and that no matter how dark and hopeless the world around us can seem, there are better days ahead for those who fight for them.

We can choose to suffer or to blossom; to drown in our sadness or to grow lotuses from the mud.

By falling down, I found freedom. By falling apart, I was able to rebuild. And looking back at this song that broke the dam inside of my heart those years ago, I smile at the gift that it was. For in the flood of emotions, I was swept on a journey that would lead to life so rich, I can’t imagine not being present for it.