There is no perfect world.

It's easy to look into someone else's life and think everything looks perfect.  It's easy to look down the road of my own future and imagine a picture-perfect world waiting for me there.  It's harder to realize..there is no perfect.  Even when people land the right job, marry the right person, have great kids, there are challenges..people get sick, people get discouraged, people feel lonely.  There are financial challenges, physical challenges, emotional challenges, spiritual challenges.

What's perfect about this imperfect world is that we wake up everyday and we get to learn, or attempt to learn, how to respond to everything.  And, if we're very diligent and the people around us are very diligent, we respond with love and they share their love with us.  Life may be a mess, it may always be a mess, but I'm pretty sure, even though I'm very young, that that is not really the point.

The point is what we do with the mess, how we deal with our surroundings, how we give from our hearts, and how we learn to love and care for others in spite of the mess.  I feel like school and work and our culture teach us to keep improving everything.  To work towards something that looks efficient, that looks correct.  But, in life, when you are done climbing one hill, you are given another.  There is no "A" or "correct" you can reach or sustain.  There's no destination where, once you have finally done everything right, you're done and everything looks right.  There will always be something awry, always something to challenge us.

So, I am (very diligently, though it's very difficult) trying to embrace the challenges.  Trying to see the beauty in the mundane or tedious or painful or scary.  Trying to recognize that, even though life isn't perfect, beautiful, incredible, miraculous things happen all the time.  If we are too busy asking "how? how will it happen?" we might miss those unfolding right before us..we may lose the opportunity to enjoy the present moment and to love others as well as we might.  We may even forget to celebrate.