If you're not hip to the lingo the term lit is now being used to reference anything that is awesome, turned up, exciting, intoxicating in any manner, that lights one up, as if lit from within. Parties, outfits, substances, music, food, places, possessions, money, careers, and even people can be a source of awesomeness and excitement that helps to light us up, providing us with an intoxicating hit. Throw them all together and you will start to understand why it is so hard for most individuals to light themselves up naturally. It is why we struggle to just be. To just be alone, to just be quiet, to just be still, to have less, to let go of our ego, all of these things are foreign because of this mash up of an overwhelming 24-hours-a-day stimulation. We have slowly grown accustom to receiving multiple sources of these outside things to make us "happy", "calm", "content" or more appropriately, just distracted.

The problem is these will only work for a short moment, and then you're back to the sadness, the solitude and the quiet. If this place is uncomfortable and unfamiliar it may be time to get to know this place a little better. Inside each of us is a comfort zone and an un-comfort zone. They both have really valuable things to each us but we will only decipher what they are by spending time in both spaces. That space where we are sad, fearful, stressed, frustrated, angry, jealous, or whatever other spaces are uncomfortable for you, are meant to be explored. They are meant to be felt and to be experienced fully and presently, and no this does not feel good. But that does not mean that we aren't meant to feel it. It is only through the mud that the lotus flower can bloom. It is only by sitting with those feelings (whether on your own, with a loved one, or with a professional) that it can it all start to become clear again. The clouds may come but behind the clouds the sky is still blue. You have to learn to sit in the cold, cloud covered, lots of times stormy spaces, and patiently wait the suns return. Nurture your self and do what's best so that you can be in the mud, perhaps you turn it completely into a mud bath, fancy spa treatment. #selflove

It is in these quiet, cloudy moments that the challenges start to unfold and become lessons, making you stronger and wiser than you were before, preparing you for the next step on your path. If you run from these moments and instead drown them out with all of the outside noise and nonsense, you will miss out on that lesson and be forced to stay right where you are, you will be stagnant, forced to sit around and wait for this same lesson to come around again. You will continue to encounter the same storm over and over, a groundhogs day moment everyday. Sitting in this space is no easy feat, but just like anything else it is a practice. The more you choose to experience it the easier it is to move through, and if there is ever a truly unfortunate circumstance such as a family members illness or death, you will have been practicing moving through these emotions and it may be just that much easier to endure.

You have a choice to run or to stay. If you choose to run start to ask yourself why. If you choose to stay start to ask yourself why. These thoughts are scary at first but then comes that moment of enlightenment, your ah-ha moment and then you move on, tackling the next mountain and peeling the next layer all while moving closer to the truest, happiest version of yourself. You will be learning to become lit from within.

Sadness give roots. Happiness gives branches. Both are needed. - Osho