I received an email the other day,
“I had a particularly difficult day yesterday and in my helpless pathetic state a friend of mine tried to convince me to believe that I’m worth more to people than the ways I’m able to enhance their lives, the things I can do for them. I had a hard time wrapping my mind around that. Obviously it’s true, but for other people, ya know? Then this morning I read your post about your brother and it made me tear up. I’m on a journey to believe things I know are true and it’s nice to know I’m not alone and it’s nice to be reminded because I’m stubborn.”
What caught me the most was this line, “Obviously it’s true, but for other people, ya know?”
I definitely know.
In my reply I wrote,
“I think of how (more often than not) I see people’s flaws, don’t expect perfect from them, and love them all the same. Yet why is it hard to believe people have the same capacity to do the same with me.”
That’s what I love most about this exchange of writing and reading. There’s a hope in it. Even if the story doesn’t have a clean and clear ending, the hope lies in knowing someone feels the same way, that there are words to capture it. And somehow, not being alone in our feelings is encouraging.
I kept going back to that simple email this week and how encouraging it was to me. And I wonder how she’ll feel when she reads this post and sees her own words and the truth it’s carried to me.
I ended my email response with,
“Thank you for sharing where you are and letting me know we’re in the same space. That’s where the hope lies for me, in knowing we’re not alone in feeling and working through certain experiences. What this blog has been for you, this email has been for me.”
I hope you could think of someone to send an email or short text to. Appreciate them and the space you both hold.
That’s the power of words, it bridges us.
I came from the future to tell you that I found this amazing time machine. You know the question: “What superpower would you have?” I don’t know if you ever answered this question. I wonder what your answer would be, but I kind of imagine what it could be. I hope you know, though, that you have the power to touch people’s lives with your words, and it transcends time. You wrote it a few years ago, and it speaks to me today. I come here to read your posts occasionally, reading them in no specific order. And today, after I read this one, it all clicked—it described exactly how I feel when I’m doing it:
“That’s the power of words, it bridges us.”
I know you still write, but I don’t know if you still share. I think you should; it’s rare to find Janeles.