Experience teaches me again and again that reaching one’s goal is not quite as satisfying as one imagines it will be.
While each accomplishment is certainly an occasion to celebrate, each is also a time to mourn… to say goodbye to opportunities that no longer exist… to bid farewell to the friends made along the way… to lament a glorious adventure that can never be lived again.
But, most of all, each is a time to grieve for the person I used to be… transfigured by the trials and hardships endured, enlightened by the truths and falsehoods revealed, at once humbled by the exposure of my shortcomings, but empowered by the discovery of virtues and talents I did not know I possessed… and “rewarded” with the hunger for even greater challenges and greater responsibilities in the next upward spiral of becoming… hopefully just one of many more to come.
