Wednesday's Inspiration

Many times our roads are filled with speed bumps. Many times our roads are filled with uncertainty and doubt. It is what we do in those times that determine so much not only about our lives, but about who we are as people. So often I feel as if I am not only taking the road less traveled, but the road that no one has traveled on. I feel as if I am trampling through uncharted territory all alone. This feeling often causes me to doubt so much of what I am doing. But, when I pause and think about it, we are all traveling on our own paths alone. Each of us is walking through uncharted territory, a road less traveled if you will,  because each of us is living a life that is unique only to us. How can we possibly expect others to have gone down a path only we can take? I think that what most important, and what this poem hints at to me, is that we must live a life that it authentic to us. Yes, we are all living a life unique to us, but so often we copy others and their decisions because we don't want to be singled out as being different. We want to be unique, but not so much so that it causes others to critique our lives. Living truly by our inner voices regardless of what others think is incredibly hard to do. So, even though I falter and even though I doubt, I am going to carry on trying to live my life as authentically as possible because that is what the road less traveled is all about. Are you with me? Robert Frost (1874–1963).  Mountain Interval.  1920.

1. The Road Not Taken

TWO roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth;         5   Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same,         10   And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.         15   I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I— I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.