It's easy to say, isn't it - 'life goes on'... I've heard similar statements all my life: "she'll be right mate..." "There's always tomorrow...!" "Ah well, that's life". When I truly think about it though, I find that statement to be both flippant and correct.

Flippant because it's often thrown out in casual conversation where it's not meant to be taken seriously. For example, I've left my wallet at home when I need it... or I can't find my keys... "Ah well, life goes on". It's not a situation that is going to have any effect on me in the long term.

However, the same flippant statement is also widely used in completely different contexts. My background is in health care, and I have spent quite a lot of time surrounded by people experiencing highs and lows in life - particularly those who are faced with tragedies and have life changing decisions to make, or people whose lives are about to change dramatically due to the loss or severe injury of a loved one.

The way people respond to such situations varies widely depending on several factors such as family background, degrees of separation to the person involved, severity of incident, age of people involved, spiritual or religious backgrounds, and many many more factors. Sometimes people scream, cry, yell the place down, start throwing things, collapse etc.. and others go quiet, smile, reflect on the person or family involved, hug each other or start making phone calls.

Often during these times I will hear such expressions: "it could have been worse"... "At least (such and such) didn't happen"... "life goes on"...

The point of the matter is this: it's normal and natural to respond to such situations in a variety of ways. It's normal to go through a grieving pattern and process, and to handle each situation differently. When it really comes down to it however, "life goes on" is not such a silly phrase: in reality, it's often a sobering but true concept.

It's good to live our lives with a "life goes on" attitude. I'm not trying to downplay the seriousness of injury, death or tragedies, but it's important to realise that things happen in this world that are out of our control.

Sometimes they are flippant things that don't really matter, other times they are life changing.

We can go on. Human's have an amazing ability to adjust to given situations, and we really can go on. Life goes on - how true that is. Often we don't know why bad things happen, we don't know why we have been put in situations that just aren't fair. When a child dies, why is that?! It's so devastating for everyone involved.

Life goes on.

Life goes on.

We are all here for a reason, and it may not be until 20, 30 years down the road where we can reflect on what has happened and truly make more sense of it all.

I'm sorry if you have had things happen in your life that are unfair, or tragically devastating. Certainly I've also had things happen that are unjust, unfair, sad. Don't give up!

You are an important part of this world, and you are here for a reason!

- Article posted in Encouragement