I’ve just written a post about not wanting to be a person that I was and that I should focus on moving forward as who I am now. It’s got me thinking a few thing about moving on and the process of it. I think we’re all guilty of sometimes living in the past. We all like to reminisce and chat about fond memories but there’s a danger of always living in the past.

Losing my dad was the hardest thing I ever had to deal with. It was awful, I never thought I’d smile again, I never thought I’d get over it. And that’s true, I’m not, I never will be, I’ll always miss him and wish he was here. I’ll always want him back. But life did carry on and I’ll can look back on is memories. Life carried on because it has to, I couldn’t live in the past because dad was here to do that with. Things had to move forward and I had to learn to cope and carry my grief with me. The same is true for life in general.

Life moves forward, people change, things change, situations change, people grow and you have to accept it. There’s a certain amount of control as well chance and fate navigating your destiny and you have to roll with it and just enjoy the ride. But it’s not that easy and it’s hard to accept things at times.

You’ve got accept sometimes that people aren’t always going to be in your life. Friendships and relationships evolve and change, people you were once close to may at some point become strangers. I never thought I’d become a divorcee. Marriage is forever and I thought I’d be with my husband forever, now he’s just a man I used to know. So are several people in my life. Some family members and friends who I was once tight knit with are now almost passers by. Not all have necessarily been through fall outs or break ups, it’s just been the natural evolving of life, it’s just been how things have gradually panned out. This can be hard though, a death is final and out of your control so in someways is easier to accept because it’s done. It is what it is so you have to grieve and then build up a life without that person.

Friendships and relationships it’s not so easy to do. When people still exist but start to either drift from your life or your or they choose not to be in it anymore, it can be harder to handle. However, you cannot be sad about it for too long and you cannot chase it. In chasing it, you’re chasing the past, your chasing a memory and something that happened. You’ve got to move forward, you’ve got to focus on making new memories and life becoming what it is now.

Someone once said to me how it was sad growing up and sad that friendships or relationships grew a part as they do. But I don’t think it is, people are in your life at any one time for a reason and if the natural course of events means they then end up leaving it’s because it’s meant to happen. You’ve both nearby and gained what you needed from each other and then it’s maybe time to move on to something else, something different and something maybe better? I don’t feel sad or regret people or thing that have been or happened in my life they happened and were there for a reason and now I have the memory to look back on. I suppose it’s like the quote, don’t be sad because it’s over, smile because it happened.

I guess it’s about learning to accept, it’s learning to just accept that things have happened as they are and that life moves on. I had to accept that my dad died, I had just allow for it to have happened and let my life continue. Similarly, I have had to accept that my marriage was not one I could live in, I’ve had to accept that I’m now on my own and I need to build my life as it is now moving forward. I’ve had to accept that some friends have drifted and that we are no longer close or have things in common, but that that’s ok because new people have arrived and brought with them new things to the table. I’ve had to accept that my life and choices and world has moved on, I’m a different person now to who I was, yesterday, last week, last month, last year etc. I’ve different interests and different things are important to me now and that means different people belong in my life now and that’s ok.

Life goes on and we’ve all got to learn to accept that and enjoy it for what it is.