7 Lifetimes

“Time is a proverbial loop, a series of deja vu moments that intertwine and end up back where they began, except when they don’t.” ~Theodicus

Personally, I feel like I’ve lived 7 different lifetimes, and while I was experiencing each of them they seemed like they were the only one, that there would never be another. In that way each of them has surprised me, except for the first, because it was all I knew until the second arrived.

In each lifetime there are people who overwhelm me with their intensity and their conversational nature. They see me better than I see myself, and they give me insight into both myself and the world around me. I change because of them, and that change has pushed me forward toward being a stronger, more self-fulfilled human being.

There are also people who act as antagonists to my main character, but somehow they too make me a stronger, more self-fulfilled human being.

In each lifetime there is a solid plot, even if I don’t recognize it for what it is until I’m on to the next one. There is a firm beginning, some kind of climax, and a resolution that most times seems negative in the experiencing of it. I say negative because it is this resolution that usually shoves me violently into the next lifetime, as red as a newborn, and lost for what I should do next.

There is generally a love interest in each lifetime as well, some yin to my yang, someone whom I generally overwhelm with my generous personality. I say generous but I mean gregarious. I mean larger than life, and while I know most people can’t handle that I don’t know any other way to be. And sometimes my love interest isn’t interested in me in return, or sometimes she is unavailable. Sometimes I have been unavailable as well. But love doesn’t adjust.

Each lifetime is different, though. Sometimes one lasts for a year, while another makes it only to 4 months, while yet another stretches into 13 years. The older I get the easier it is to see the line before I get to it, to read the signs that say another lifetime is coming, so I should gird myself with everything I know about me. It signals a change, a shift in my own thought process that can be positive. I have to keep that in mind.

Because I tend to be pessimistic — I mean realistic — about those shifts in my own thought processes. I have been known to let myself go, but I can’t afford to do that, not anymore. Life is a lot shorter than it was when I was living through that 1st lifetime, when the entire world was wide open to me, before so much heartbreak on both sides. Now I have to remember why each one ended, so that I can stop it before it happens again.

Because 7 is my lucky number, and if I can make this one my last lifetime I will do everything in my power to do just that.

Sam