It’s always exciting to me when a chapter of my life is drawing to an end. The older I get, the more I am able to look-back on each chapter with pride and contentment. Perhaps this is because so much of my early chapters were filled with struggle, heartache and pain and as I get further away from them, filling my book with more adventures and happy moments, there are simply more memories from which to choose than there once was.

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I am also more excited than I used to be at the start of a new chapter. When I was younger, so much of my life was a blank page and I didn’t understand or fully appreciate the wonder of that.

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I recall when I was in my early 20’s, reflecting on my life and waiting for it to begin. In my mid-20’s, thinking I had experienced so much and yet, still thinking that I was still just waiting for when life would really start for me. At that time, I had only lived a small handful of chapters.

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Even though I somehow, at least on an intellectual level, knew that this was life, that it had begun, I didn’t feel it and I was still waiting.

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I used to meditate on the idea and try to will my whole being to a great epiphany of in-the-moment realization that this was life and it was wondrous. Then, one day, without me even noticing, it just happened.

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I can look-back on so much of my life and see these clear chapters, separations, moments of endings and new beginnings, of loss, of gain, of growth of retreat.

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And it’s all glorious.

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Now, more than when I was young, I revel at those blank pages. I am excited to think what stories, adventures, sites, smells, sounds and memories are going to fill these pages. I have a deeper appreciation for what it means to really be able to “look-back” and reflect on things.

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Natasha Bedingfield sings a song called “Unwritten” that has just started playing in my head as I am writing this:

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One day, years from now, I will be looking-back on this new chapter after it has been finished and I have moved-on to a new one, maybe even several new ones, and I will see the flashes of happy Christmases, sorrows and loss, moments of silliness, mistakes made, feelings of pride as well as accomplishment and, what I’m most looking-forward to, memories that are, heavily, steeped in love.

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I will be changed then, as I am now from the 20 year old me that was so eager for life to start.

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But, one thing will always remain – this is my story.

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And, I love it.

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