life is lifeing

here's to existential spirals to start the week off right

I was working from a new coffee shop last week, and as I sat down at my table and situated myself with my laptop, yogurt bowl, and latte there was a group of three women two tables over from me drinking their drinks and chatting away as if time did not exist.

I took a second to just wonder about them as I always seem to do when I’m surrounded by people I don’t know on a personal level. What do they do for a living? How long have they known each other? Did they grow up in this area or relocate due to a job, spouse, etc.

As I dug into my long list of Monday morning to do’s I tuned out their conversation and went about my morning - answering emails, updating spreadsheets, slacking my boss, the usual. At one point, their conversation which had sounded very upbeat, positive, and relatively happy took a slight turn when one of the women shared about a personal health concern and the need to schedule some doctor’s appointments in the near future. When you’re in such close confines like a cafe, it’s hard to not overhear the people next to you. Not that I was being nosey but sometimes you just zone out of your own world and into someone else’s.

In the midst of their deep exchange, I heard one of the women respond with “life is lifeing” and it struck me like a chord. As I thought about that statement and what it actually means, it immediately got me thinking and sent me into an existential spiral — something I have far too often than I’d like to admit. Thoughts of ‘what even is the meaning of life?’ ‘what does it mean to be alive?’ started to swirl in my brain and while the answers to these questions vary amongst individuals, is there some form of overlap in the answer?

While yes the statement that was made can open up a can of worms and make you think about every single thing that has happened in your life, I reeled in my thoughts and started to relate the statement back to the three women sitting in the corner. Having not known them, I can completely relate to the anxiety and overwhelm this women expressed when speaking about anything health related.

Life is hard. It’s a rollercoaster filled with highs, lows and everything in between. Nothing is as perfect as it seems and hearing conversations like this was just a simple reminder that we’re all more alike than we are different and at the end of the day, every single person on this earth is dealing with something we know nothing about.