Nobody Wins the Race

Your

Black

Could be someone’s

White

Could be someone’s

Black

Both are colors just the same

But do you think yours is superior?

Maybe you are arrogant or

Maybe you just don’t know any better than to put yourself at the top

Yet if you walk through life on stilts

You are looking down on everybody

Those sticks are not stable ground

You are

Alone

You will fall

Or sometimes you feel like an ant scurrying along a seemingly neverending path

And it appears easy for everyone else to walk through it.

You know you’re never going to get there before they will,

Even though you are running as fast as you can.

They are taking easy strides with less effort and still finishing first

So why should you try?

You are at the bottom

You think you are looking up for inspiration but really

You are only setting standards you can’t reach and it isn’t because your arms are too short or you aren’t strong enough to touch it or your tippy toes just can’t point enough

It is because that tree was not growing for you

It’s not your property and it’s not your life

There’s no harmony in comparing yourself to others until the point where you are not satisfied with your own being

It isn’t about ranking on a scoreboard or arranging people like a stacked pile of freshly folded laundry

Please try

Next time your eyes jealously gloss over to another person’s paper and you wish you wrote what they wrote and you want to see what they saw and do what they did

Don’t let your stomach become queasy and let the tears rush to your eyes

Relax

Breathe in

Find peace when you embrace the differences instead of picking a side that is better

And there is no point in putting yourself in someone else’s shoes if you are going to tear them apart and cover them in dirt

or polish them when the other person didn’t want them touched

You can look at their shoes

Observe them

Embrace them

But maybe you are not ready to put them on yet

They aren’t your size and aren’t for your aching feet