will i ever be happy again? yes you will.

a piece on finding happiness after ruin. on how suffering stretches the edges of joy, and how neither feeling—no matter how crushing or fleeting—ever stays the same

Oh, the paradox, the cruel betrayal of life—that you only learn to see clearly when the moment is slipping from your grasp. That you only taste joy in its fullness when you have learned the bitterness of its absence. That you don’t really know abundance, don’t really feel the weight of love, don’t really understand how much of the world is yours until the moment you are about to lose it. Maybe not even then. Maybe not until it’s already gone. There is no such thing as happiness untouched by suffering. Not once you have known suffering. Pain is an architect, reshaping you from the inside…

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