Even if your entire life was a nightmare, it’s only the blink of an eye compared to eternity.

I find a lot of comfort in that.

I think of Kimmie Schmidt: “You can do anything for 10 seconds.” And then you repeat.

My old trainer would tell me, “You can do anything for a minute. Don’t stop.”

I remembered that when I was in labor with my two younger boys. Contractions last for approximately a minute. “You can do anything for a minute.”

Mental and emotional exertion are a bit different… you can endure longer… “You’ve waited six months. You can do another six weeks.”

In both instances, you have to stay the course. If you get off track and stop pushing half way through the minute-long contraction, you’re adding another push to your delivery. If you’re in jail, and you act out, time is added to your sentence.

Sobriety is similar. If you slip up, you at minimum have to face a hangover again. At maximum, you drink through that hangover. You risk the cycle persisting. One drink is playing Russian Roulette with your life. It’s a game of life or death, much like childbirth and prison.

Pain is temporary by default. Freedom is forever, but it isn’t free. It is cultivated through mental and spiritual endurance, which is produced through overcoming hardship and adversity. Freedom is not a physical state, but fortitude of the mind.

So what am I even talking about? Backsliding vs. focus, I suppose. The purpose of pain. Not trading what you want now, for what you want most.

Yes… that’s the point.