NO RETREAT!!!!

If you follow my blog at all you will see that I've been struggling with the trials of life. I've been ready to give up. Such is the flow of life. You have ups and downs. However, there is no room in life for retreat. Turning back is shameful, heartless, and out right inappropriate.

This is not to say that one can't change their mind or change course. It's just to say that you can't sit around sulking about the past, about what you have done. You must accept it, evaluate it, learn from it, and move on. I have thought a million times how any number of decisions could have altered my life in a positive way. I could almost widdle it down to five moves that would have forever changed my history. But as the great poet Jay-Z says, "Time don't go back, it goes forward. Can't run from the pain, run towards it."

This life is full of pain. This world is full of hurt. Tragedy and death come to us all. Can't run from it. Can't hide from it. Can't escape it. The very nature of man has chained each and every one of us to it. You either stand around waiting for something to happen or you make something happen. Either way you go somethings going to happen. Better to take a hit in motion than to take the full blunt force of it. Either you happen on life or life happens on you. I'll take the former.

One of my favorite movies is 300. It's a manly man's movie. Full of blood, violence, and warriors. As the mighty King Leonidas was leading his men off to battle the narrator states that there is no room for tender moments. He says, "Only the hard and the strong...only the hard...only the strong." That is life. For a man this is the truth.

So here I stand, past behind me. Present in hand. Future ahead. I don't have it all planned out but I must go on. Another great warrior movie is Braveheart. There the great William Wallace has advanced his forces deep into England. He is preparing to fight for the King's home and set his people free. He is visited by the beautiful Princess Isabella. During there conversation she tells him that he is too far from home to turn back, but doesn't have the resources to go on. It is then that she offers her help with the attack.

I like Wallace, I am too far from home to turn back. Yet, at this moment I don't have the resources needed to complete my journey. I stand in need of a Princess Isabella. One that would provide me with what I need to make this final concourse. One that would offer the support needed to continue on. That may or may not come. If not then I shall stand like King Leonidas in the face of certain death. There is no retreat. There is no shrinking back. If death be before me then I shall prepare for glory. Until such a time, I shall await that beautiful moment. There shall be no retreat!!!