Photo credit: Jessy Marie; used with permission

This is one of my daughter's first attempts a few years back at the art of photgraphy, and it happens to be one of my all-time favorites. This photo says something to me. It tells a story--one about a solitary journey.

Looking down these old wooden stairs makes me realize that some journeys follow a fairly straight path, but although the path is without detours, we must still use effort to climb each step to reach the top. We might skip up these stairs, or climb them slowly, carefully. We may or may not use the hand rail for support, but we know it's there. And many have gone before us and many will travel these worn stairs long after we're gone.

Life's journey is much like this. Sometimes we're given an obvious path to follow. We must reach up--higher!--to obtain our goals. To reach the top we must want to. So we push on. But many of us climb our stairs and never take a moment to pause, turn and reflect on just how far we've come. When we do this, we acknowledge our solitary journey.

I invite you to take a solitary journey and look back down these steps. What steps did you climb to get where you are today? Acknowledge each of them. These are your footprints, ones you left while climbing. Have you reached your destination? Are you at "the top"? Or are there more steps to climb? Focus only on the positive. Look how far you've come!

When I look at this photo, I envision that I'm standing a few steps from the top. There are still more steps for me to climb, and I'm so excited about where they'll take me. I wonder where I'll be next year...another step higher? Two? The suspense is killing me!

~Cheryl Kaye Tardif

http://www.cherylktardif.com