Motivational Aveline
Aveline would scrub a hand down the back of her neck and sigh as she mulled over the right way to phrase her thoughts. “There isn’t always a way to make things better,” she would say. “As a friend, I would like nothing better than to tell you that your burdens will soon be over. But, you didn’t ask for that. You asked for me, and I will not lie to you. Your burdens feel heavy, feel unending, and sometimes they are. Sometimes they feel all the heavier, knowing you have to pick them up tomorrow, simply you must. Because there is no one else who can, or would, or because you trust no one else to do it the way it needs to be done.”
“There is a certain amount of pride in it, but weariness, too. And I am here to tell you that it is not weak or selfish to lay aside your burdens when you need to, if only for a little while each day. Get that coffee with extra cream in the mornings, or turn off your phone when you take a bath so that you feel utterly alone in that moment.”
“You are a strong person,” she would say with utter sincerity, “but no one person can be strong all the time. Not you, and not me. Trust yourself, if only for five minutes, and lay aside your burdens. I will take them for you while you rest. You may trust me with them, as I have always trusted you. And when you are ready, I will give them back, but only so that I may walk beside you the rest of the way.”