Writing prompt: if I took a day off as a child, what would I do?
Play. And admit defeat.
Play in the fields, filled with, you know, what the backyard garden’s got and how it grew calla lilies and chrysanthemum.
And admit defeat. Not because we didn’t want to win, but because we’ve lost ourselves for fearing the future too much that we can’t do anything.
That’s it. That’s it. No more ambitious Mario Party re-rolls. No more all-nighters for that one difficult test.
We’ve been telling ourselves for so long that we need to keep going, to push through the uncertainty until “I make it”.
But.
What if this journey, with all its stops and starts, its moments of doubt and victories, is the very thing we’ve been searching for?
I wonder if, for a moment, the world would seem lighter, as if the weight I’ve been carrying all this time wasn’t really mine to hold. That the fear of the future is just proof that I’m not really mine.
But there’s a certain kind of hope in that thought, isn’t there? The idea that stillness could heal, when a day as a child had no guilt, no sense of time slipping through my fingers. It was enough just to be curious. Without purpose.
Even the still waters, quiet and unmoving, are part of the journey. Eventually, they return to the highlands, finding their way back to the source. Maybe, in the same way, I need to return to mine.
What are we searching in all this?
Maybe the hope lies in the fact that we’re still asking, still seeking, still becoming, still learning.
(But what if life really ends after graduation and you had nothing to do? Luck happens differently for everyone.)
(Why be so negative?)
Maybe admitting defeat is the answer.
Because even still waters return to highlands. We will move again for the time being. By choice. By chance.
What if the morning came with no call to rise? Would the earth still hum beneath gentle steps, and would the wind carry secrets of dreams half-lives?
If the world were untouched by time, would the rivers remember the paths they long to carve? Could the trees still whisper truths to those who listen, and would the mountains bend to meet the still waters below?
Even if our journey didn’t make us successful,
It’s made us courageous.
A truly noble, noble attitude.
It’s made us truly, truly courageous.
