This afternoon I went for a walk. I crossed the river, looked at abandoned buildings downtown, balanced along the edge of a fountain and hopped back down to the sidewalk.
This completely amazes me.
The reason is that in summer 2009 I broke my ankle in a parkour accident. (I don’t blame parkour, I blame my bad training habits.) I didn’t know it was broken at the time; neither did the doctors.
“You’ll heal up in no time,” a nurse promised me. “You’re young.”
You’re lying, I thought.
She wasn’t, not on purpose, but she was wrong. Her cheerful reassurance was no match for the ominous black bruises circling my leg. My ankle was bigger than a grapefruit, so big the stretching of the skin itself was painful.
The doctors didn’t see the break on the X-ray, and told me my ankle was merely sprained. Within days they told me to walk on it.
The broken ankle collapsed into pieces.
Gambling with Doctors
“Have you ever done this particular operation before?” I asked the surgeon.
“Yes, once,” he said.
“Did it work?”
“No. It failed under weight and shattered again.” He looked away. “Yours might be different.”
My other option was to have the man fuse my ankle permanently. It would never move normally again, but it would stop hurting and bear my weight.
Not good enough. I chose to have him attempt to rebuild it.
Now, 20 months after the original injury, I still have pain, stiffness and limited mobility. It is a constant struggle to train the ankle, to get back to my original level of performance. I keep working at it.
The Sweetest Thing
I’ve written before about how walking through the countryside helped me understand my purpose in life. For someone who intends to walk across two continents, the idea of losing the use of a leg was completely horrifying.
This is the part where I’m supposed to give a heartwarming moral. “I prayed every day and I totally recovered!” No, not here.
I did learn many things from my injury, but the truth is most of them are not heartwarming.
I learned that being injured is emotional. The body throws a lot of hormones around to manage pain and it left me both exhausted, and emotionally tipsy. Plus I learned that having everyone open doors for you gets old fast.
However, I also learned something very important about myself.
Even if I could never walk right again, that was not going to stop me.
I don’t say that lightly. The idea that I would never again wield a sword terrified me. The possibility of no more climbing or running or vaulting brought me to my very lowest. I did not just throw it off and laugh.
But as I hobbled along the country roads and thought about my dream, I knew that I would go as long as I was able to move. Because to me, walking outdoors is the sweetest thing.
I believe that this kind of dedication and certainty is how you know you’ve found your purpose.
Have You Found Yours?
People often think that their life purpose should be obvious, or that when they find it they’ll know it.
The truth is many people discover their life purpose and think of it first as a hobby, an obligation, or a distant dream. There are many ways to stumble upon it and not realize how important it is to you.
But if you are willing to keep at something even when it means tremendous sacrifice, you’ve found something special. Something essential to the core of your being.
So what is it?
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Drew Jacob, Rogue Priest
March 21st, 2011 at 8:42 am
What I love about your posts, and what keeps bringing me back is that you make them so personal, personal for yourself, and personal for the reader. I think there is merit/acceptance/caregiving in writing about ourselves, and reading about others. When we write we focus, when we read about someone else and can identify, we learn and isn’t the best life schoolhouse.
March 21st, 2011 at 11:30 am
Ha, sometimes I get in trouble by writing TOO personal a style… frequently I have friends or family members ask, “Was this post about ME?” Of course not, but I can see why they see themselves in my writing because it is so much about my personal experience.
March 21st, 2011 at 11:29 am
Thank you so much for posting this. I really enjoy reading your blog and it makes me happy to see other people *living*. I never thought about what I was doing in terms of a Heroic path. I suppose I still don’t, but your blog makes me see myself in a different light.
My partner and I have been on a path to living our dreams over the last two years and we are getting so close. It is making us anxious because there are so many little things yet to be done.
I don’t care what it is that someone else wants to do, I just think that it is important that we actually do something. Keep writing about it. I think the idea will catch on.
March 21st, 2011 at 11:51 am
I’m so glad you keep coming back, Laura! I love hearing about people who are pursuing their dreams. If you are doing it in a way that will help others, then it is Heroic. And it sounds like you are :)
March 21st, 2011 at 12:18 pm
whenever I read about your beliefs and how you apply them in real life, I smile out of a feeling of complicity. Knowing, my friend, that there is someone out there that shares the depths of their inner processes in the face of daunting odds and how they go about persevering is truly inspiring, and I see myself reflected in you so clearly… I can’t wait to have that foot and its twin bring you closer to where we can walk together. It’s not just a pleasure and an honor to be your friend: it’s a true blessing. Ho.
March 21st, 2011 at 7:52 pm
@everyone: people like Cintain are proof that broadening your horizons is awesome. How would I have known that some 1,000 miles away I have someone who is like a brother to me, unless I got out of my box?
March 22nd, 2011 at 12:18 am
Thank you for the beautiful and heartfelt post. I’d like to believe that most people, at some point or another, are faced with something that could potentially take them down and shatter their dreams. I would like to think that ultimately it DOES propel us forward, cements our aspirations and sends us back out there stronger, fitter, faster and more ready than ever to reach out and grab that dream.
March 22nd, 2011 at 9:26 am
Good to see you here again Marlene. Thanks for the comment! It sounds like you are thinking of something in particular that happened – are you willing to share how you overcame it?
March 23rd, 2011 at 4:17 pm
I am more than willing to share in the hopes that someone else may find inspiration from my story and to remind myself that things can be worse. However, I am currently running from pillar to post in an attempt to meet two hundred (I think) deadlines so, with your permission, I will post something meaningful over the weekend.
March 23rd, 2011 at 4:36 pm
“With my permission” lol. Permission granted soldier!
March 24th, 2011 at 11:27 am
Lol, yeah as I say, been a long week :)
March 28th, 2011 at 8:32 am
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