The infinite power of the Universe functions on the simple principle of cause and effect. Every action, equal and opposite reaction etc. And so it goes that what you sow, so shall you reap. What you give, comes back to you, and what you ask for you shall receive.

When I pray each night I don’t know what to ask for anymore. I’ve rarely been refused. Anything I have yearned for wholeheartedly, I have gotten sooner or later. And that could go so far as to apply to those I have fallen in love with, craved, and exhausted with pleas to be mine.

Listen to me. You don’t always know what is best for you. This is a fact. And because you are insistent, single-minded, determined, and fairly stupid you will get what you demand from life. But now enough. Shut up. Stop asking and start thanking. Say thank you for everything you have and don’t have (think leprosy, gingivitis, or thirst for revenge).

Say thank you for the hair you have on your head. Say thank you for the boy who dumped you and the girl who went back to her husband. For some reason (you don’t need to know everything) they weren’t meant for you.

Say thank you for having the ability to express yourself where words fail others. Say thank you for being able to forgive and refusing the burden of grudges. Say thank you she didn’t call back. Or stay. Or want you. And then say another thank you if you can get through a day, a week, and then two without being cut up about it.

I wish I were clever and pedantic enough to preach to you, but I’m hardly in a position to do that. Who is, really? You will have your experiences and if you’re thoughtful, reflective or even slightly intelligent, you will learn from them. What I can do is write what I come up with. What I finally realise. What I think could be important to pay attention to. Small things that I can put away in my piggy bank of learning and turn to on the days life overwhelms and consumes me.

So.

To the girl who no longer writes to me, thank you. To the man who taught me how to trust men, thank you. To the woman who no longer returns my calls, thank you. To all the emotionally stunted relationships that have made room for alone in my life, thank you too. And thank you, lover, who did not leave a string of possibility when you went away. May you be the last.

That, I think I will ask for.