I was so blown away by the honesty in this Alice Walker quote and the personal insight gifted by the blogger who quoted it in her blog, “This Beautiful life” – that I requested and received permission to share it.  Because it’s not too late to start the New year.

“Some periods of our growth are so confusing that we don’t even recognize that growth is happening. We may feel hostile or angry or weepy and hysterical, or we may feel depressed. It would never occur to us, unless we stumbled on a book or a person who explained to us, that we were in fact in the process of change, of actually becoming larger, spiritually, than we were before. Whenever we grow, we tend to feel it, as a young seed must feel the weight and inertia of the earth as it seeks to break out of its shell on its way to becoming a plant. Often the feeling is anything but pleasant.

But what is most unpleasant is the not knowing what is happening. Those long periods when something inside ourselves seems to be waiting, holding its breath, unsure about what the next step should be, eventually become the periods we wait for, for it is in those periods that we realize that we are being prepared for the next phase of our life and that, in all probability, a new level of the personality is about to be revealed.”

—Alice Walker

I was reading through some old journals from several years back and came across this quote. I remember the exact situation I was struggling with when I wrote this quote down. I sat there in awe as I remembered how fearful and doubtful I was that I would make it through that situation. I remembered how massive and unconquerable it had felt. Yet years later, here I sat, with that situation far behind me. So far behind that I almost had forgotten about it.

As I continued to sit there, I was reminded of all the mountains I have overcome in life and all the challenges I conquered. I began to realize that they all had two things in common.  They all broke me down, pushed me, challenged me. There were time I did not think I would make it through or that the end would ever come. There were times I wanted to quit or did not think I could keep going but each time, by the grace of God, I made it through. I always came out on the other side stronger, more confident and grateful than when I began. Just like all these challenges in my past, there will be times I doubt myself or feel as though I can not continue. But it is in those moments that I must remind myself that I am being stretched and prepared to conquer something greater than I could ever imagine.

More of this blogger’s thoughts and life are viewable over at her blog, “This Beautiful Life” – subtitled “Find Yourself, and be just that”.