To be a Colossus

Friend, our existence is full of rules – all the shoulds – that never ending list of things that we’re supposed to do, or be, or have.

Gradually it begins to make us feel inadequate and lost. As though we’re wading into a pool teaming with razor sharp claws hell-bent on ripping us apart, pulling off all the hopes and dreams, the things seen as insubstantial, thus leaving us feeling small.

I am tired of feeling small, friend, of feeling that my efforts are not enough and that the things that I pour my energies into are going unnoticed or unappreciated. I want to be seen as mighty and powerful.

I want to feel like a giant, a Colossus.

However, as my legs are stretched between all the things that are required of me, and the dreams and hopes I aspire to, I can’t help but feel shaken and damn near collapse.

Even the great Colossus of Rhodes collapsed one day, shaken by a mighty earthquake.

So too, could I.

With every criticism, every raised eyebrow, with every veiled insult I feel the tremors.

Perhaps there are some who are automatically geared to want to tear people down, to test the fortitude and perseverance of the dreamers. For, while my heart may ache with the harsh words, I can’t help but want to try harder to be more.

I strive to be firm and resolute.

Unwavering.

There is a danger therein, when one becomes so firm and resolute so as to be stubborn and unmovable.

“In flood time you can see how some trees bend,

And because they bend, even their twigs are safe,

While stubborn trees are torn up, roots and all.

And the same things happen in sailing:

Make your sheets fast, never slacken — and over you go,

Head over heels and under: and there’s your voyage.”

Sophocles, Antigone

Perhaps this is why we were not meant to be giants, or Colossus’s. For this goal leaves us in danger of collapse. Of falling under a heavy burden we are not meant to carry.

Friend, we only need to be big in the eyes of a select few. The close ones that see us and our accomplishments, though minor in the eyes of the masses, as amazing and wondrous.

Maybe this is what each of us craves?

To be special, important and worthy.

A Colossus to one.

Maybe, just maybe, I need to harken Haemon’s words from Sophocles’s Antigone and be flexible. Perhaps that is why there I are times when I feel so shaken.

Because I want to be seen as great to all.

Instead, I need to appreciate that there are people in my life to whom I am a giant, in whose lives I live large, whose lives wouldn’t be the same without me.

There is is a little one that is my heart, and to her my kisses heal wounds.

There is a girl that gives me joy, and to her I am an ear that always listens.

There is a girl that is my muse, and to her I am inspiration.

There is a girl who is wild abandon, and to her i am a trusty side-kick.

There is a girl who is strength and resolve, and to her I am whimsy and fun.

There is a family who is my core, and to them I am their pride.

Friend, we need to stop trying to live large in the eyes of everyone… trying to please and satisfy and be everything to everyone. This will leave us exhausted and broken.

Let’s be conscious of the fact that the people whom we really let see us, the people who become our friends and family, those are the ones in whose hearts we are a Colossus.

Always,

Your Trusted Friend ❤