Every Beginning Has An End

Work ends, love ends, existence comes to an end, because sooner or later everything ends definitively. Everything in this life is temporary and the resistance to making these things something “eternal”, in general, causes us great frustrations that are difficult to overcome.

It is sensible and emotionally healthy to know how to put an end to it, when things or aspects of life no longer give more. Forcing these situations to survive, being almost dying or already dead, is like crying over spilled milk.

Nothing lasts forever, everything has an end

What happens with the greater spheres of life (dreams, intellect, love, etc.), is also reflected in the smaller spheres (material goods, beauty, fame) that also have an end. Both the big and the small ends, because everything in this life “is borrowed” and has an end.

Even these material objects, when they complete their cycle, often generate discouragement and even anger, contrary to what they produce when they are new and recently bought. This, perhaps, happens because we give them an imperishable character. With certain items even the quality of essentials, as if they were part of our own life or one more organ of our body.

When we do plastic surgeries to hide old age or do long hours of exercise, not for health, but to maintain a youthful figure, we fall into the fantasy of immortalized flowers and the reality of impossible dreams, impossible desires, of useless causes.

Because in exchange for trying to improve our physical appearance (which in some cases is possible), what we basically do is deteriorate our dignity and even our condition as human beings. Something like becoming a product of sale, trade and marketing to satisfy others.

If something has a chance to be more lasting, but not eternal, it is those intangible and profound realities. Traces such as the good and the bad teachings or the memories that we leave imprinted in the lives of other people: what we write every day in the book of our lives and in the book of the lives of others.

“No one knows what He has, until He loses it”

Many times we complain and even deny a person or some situations, until these people are no longer around, or even die, or until those situations, negative in principle, become much worse. It is the comparison that gives us a real perspective of what makes us suffer and places the intensity of our suffering on a scale.

For example, when you complain at all hours about your partner and when you are alone again, you begin to value even the smallest detail of that person. Or when you go from living in a humble house full of warmth, to a more beautiful place, but without that family atmosphere. Also when you deny a simple flu, as if it were a tragedy, until you fall ill with something more serious and you realize that it was silly.

When it all begins, most of the time, it has a halo of novelty and is full of hopeful promise. But with the passage of time, we begin to see defects more than virtues, both in objects, and in people and situations. Thus, when these realities end or disappear, the opposite occurs: we focus more on the virtues and minimize the defects. This almost always happens when there is nothing to do, when the end draws near …

The great merit of accepting things as they are

To the extent that we accept and assume that everything that begins must end, we are going to avoid more than one problem. It is not about plunging into despair, or falling into cynicism. It’s about knowing that there is always a time when we will have to say goodbye, end, and face a duel .

Knowing how to live through grief will allow us to heal the wounds left by a loss. Avoiding them or living them badly, leaves the wound open and even enlarges and infects it. Because, as in the case of love, “one nail does not remove another nail.” That is, one person is not replaced by another, overnight. T odes debts that leave without pay, must be paid at some point.

Loss and grief are a constant in our life. Throughout our entire existence we will have to say goodbye many times, to loved people, situations or objects. Everything is temporary, nothing lasts forever, not even our own life. We all know it, and yet we design the same fantasy of eternity over and over again.

Not knowing how to let go, not knowing how to say goodbye or decide the end of something can be quite problematic. Just like the opposite: don’t get involved with anything closely for fear of losing it. Perhaps if we learn to see more naturally the fact that everything is over, we will be able to enjoy more of what surrounds us here and now, instead of longing for all that when it is gone.