It's so clear to me now. Every recount of every experience, all leading to some sort of lesson. I guess you just need to be clear enough to look for it. Here's the thing, this is not just a lesson for a military spouse. This is a life lesson we can all live by.

Ever since I found myself starting on this journey I have tried to live by the "search for the lesson" philosophy and have even tried to encourage others to do the same. The tough part is being able to look for something good when you are going through something negative. Grief, anger, sadness and fear are all emotions that can come with negative events in our lives and can cloud our ability to see the light (or the lesson) that could possibly come from it. You can't force anyone to feel anything other than what they feel in those moments and sometimes going through those emotions are part of the lesson. The only thing you can do when the opportunity presents itself is to try to encourage them to see what lessons or positive experiences may have occurred as a result. Yes, that includes encouraging myself on a daily basis to look for all of the lessons and positive things in my life that are the direct result from something that happened to me that was negative.

Heck, the mere fact that I fell into depression on the most basic level can be broken down into many good things and more positive lessons learned than I can count. It breaks down like this: because I was dealing with the aftermath caused by my depression, I learned more about myself by my daily reflection. I learned about the type of person I truly want to be, mistakes to avoid in the future and have gotten so much closer to my husband. Heck, I even started to write again and I didn't know if I would ever feel inspired enough to get back to my writing.

Look, the bottom line is that bad things happen to good people every day. Each circumstance provides an opportunity for growth. I have yet to discover one bad thing that happened to me that I can't see something good in. But here's the deal, you can let the bad stuff take over your life and keep you in a dark place, or you can deal with it and then reflect back searching for something positive. I can say first hand that it's not easy to pull yourself out of the darkness but I made the decision after letting it consume me for almost 2 years to finally deal with it and I have to tell you it feels so much better to be able to leave the garbage at the curb and take away only the lessons.

Well date night is early this week so I am keeping it short.

Lesson for the day: Never stop searching for your own lessons. They are always buried somewhere in the darkness. You only have to have the desire to search for the answers.

Wishing you happiness and light!

Until Next Time,

Laura D.