A good chuckle.

I went home recently to take care of a few things and while I was hanging out at home for a bit, I was rummaging through my old room. I came across an old journal that I wrote in sporadically throughout college. I found a section that obviously covered kind of a hard time in my life. It included some really sad entries, emotionally-charged entries, confused entries, even a few self-loathing entries. I know it sounds awful, but it happened so I wrote about it. Some of the entries I vividly remember writing and some I completely forgot about. Either way, it was a bit of a flashback.

And here's the important part--I found myself laughing out loud as I read. I was reading some really sad things I wrote that, at the time, were really painful, and here I sat years later laughing at some of it. Not that I thought any of it was particularly humorous. I don't really know why I laughed. Maybe because I'm just so far past it, and it doesn't phase me anymore. Maybe because I was more immature about things back then. Maybe because I'm just happy now. I don't know. But it felt good.

It was a really good reminder for me. I'm reminded that I might have times where I feel like my world is crumbling around me, but that further down the road I will probably be laughing about it.  If that doesn't give me a big fat sense of hope, I don't know what does.