Legacy

Not really a screenplay, but more of an essay kind of deal. Think of it as a written speech of encouragement. Hope you enjoy.

Legacy

So I’ve noticed a lot of negativity with my friends and family over the last few months, everyone seems to be having personal demons and major conflicts hitting them. It’s life sadly, and anyone who’s been around the block a time or two knows this to be a universal fact. But it makes me want to say something, give some kind of words of encouragement to all of you. My past battles were hard, but I know many people had it worse than me and that no two people have the same type of chaos in their lives. Personal conflicts can be as unique as our personalities. However, because we all experienced some type of conflict, that each and every one of us knows what it is like to live through pain and darkness it’s really not all that hard to connect with each other. We all needed someone close to our hearts to listen to our problems, to reach out a hand to help us back up when life pushed us down. We should all remember that we are not alone, we all needed these things and just as I used the support of my friends and family to overcome the obstacles of my life, all of you have done exactly the same in your own unique ways. It was words of encouragement that helped me through my life, and it was words of encouragement that helped all of you. I don’t know everyone’s stories by a long shot, but I do know enough to understand that not every chapter was easy to get through. I don’t care how tough you are, a lot of you are some of the toughest people I know, because at the end of the day a little help is always a reason to smile and keep going.

 I thought about using scripture, but realized not everyone here would find that comforting. I thought about maybe giving a little background on my past issues, but I don’t want this to be about me because my story is just one of billions out there. I definitely don’t want to sugar coat an entire message about how all of our problems will go away the next day and it will be sunshine and butterflies from here on out. To me, it is telling the honest truth about life that gives real long term encouragement, and the truth is guys, life can suck sometimes, it can be a cold, heartless, uncaring person who will throw every punch it has to bring us down to a grinding halt. If anything life can be compared to the weather, no matter how hard we try to predict it the weather will always surprise us, no matter how hard we try to control it, the weather will just keep on doing its own thing. You can’t tell the rain to stop and you can’t fight a tornado to the ground. So far this message hasn’t been very encouraging, can’t say my motivational skills are top notch either. Just bear with me here.

Though there are numerous ways to show how life seems to be out to get us, take a moment to remember something: life is neither good nor evil. Life is simply how we live it. Just as there are all these negative things constantly eating, tearing, knocking us around, there is also all these things that are loving, creating, and giving us hope. Just as the rain can keep coming down to flood a field till it destroys the entire crop, that very same rain can be giving water to make that field grow full of food. It’s a constant balancing act and we are right there smack in the middle of it all. Because I don’t know all of your stories, I’m not going to sit here and act like I understand the details, but I do know that you will be victorious over your battles. I know that you will fall down, but you will get back up. No matter how hard life hits us, that million dollar punch that comes around to knock us out, we will eventually find our way back to our feet and just keep going. We have two choices in life, either to lie in the rain defeated for the rest of our lives, or to get back up and continue living. Because by simply laying there, giving up is a whole new level of death. When you choose to give up fighting, you are choosing to quit life. It’s not about winning our conflicts with a 100% victory or losing them utterly. It’s about actually fighting and living it out. You are choosing to live when you get back up from whatever terrible thing that has gotten you down. It’s going to be bad sometimes, downright terrible. But you are a fighter; you are fighting to live life. Don’t believe me? Consider this: we exist in this world because our parents either chose to have children, pass on the torch of their knowledge and wisdom, or both of these things. If they had decided to quit fighting, we wouldn’t be here. Had our grandparents decided to stop fighting, we would not be here. Had our ancestors somewhere down the line decided to just stop fighting and give up on life we would not be here. Our very history represents this, not the historical people, not the battles, not the inventions, or the important moments. These things may define the finer moments in human history, but they are not the greatest moments. The greatest moments in human history is the fact that we are still here, the unwritten history of humanity is the fact that our ancestors from all across the timeline chose to live their lives the best ways they could. None of them were perfect, some had terrible lives while others had it a little better, but one and all they decided to just live out their lives. That is the true legacy of the human race, not the buildings, not the historical moments, not the people who managed to carve their names in history, it was the endless amount of stories being written, passed on, and repeated. We are the fruit of those unwritten moments of history and we are part of that legacy because we are living the history. By living the lives that our ancestors helped us to achieve, we are ensuring that our descendents will hopefully continue to fight and live on and so forth. You can be anything you want to be in life, but just know that you have already achieved something the day you were born: you took up the mantle to continue the legacy of your family’s stories by adding your own chapter to it.

No matter how bad life gets, no how terrible it all seems remember you are a fighter and you are the descendent of an entire history of fighters who all have experienced the same types of struggles in the different ways of their times. You may not think yourselves as very tough, you may not believe that you are smart enough; you may not believe you got what it takes sometimes. Let me just say that though you may believe all these things and more, by all rights everyone here is a warrior, a soldier, or whatever way you want to say it, but you have the fighting spirit. You are fighting right now by simply trying to live out your life. By writing your stories that represent your lives, you are fighting. We are the legacy of all those forgotten ancestors of ours; they were no different from us and we are just like them. They came from all walks of life, no matter the faith, race, gender, age, or class status, they were one and all true warriors.  Continue fighting guys; continue writing out your stories. Do whatever it is you decide to do in life. When everything seems hopeless, when you feel as if it can never get better just remember that you have it in yourself to rise up and win it all. You are victorious when you decide to fight. It’s not hard, it’s in our blood. Fighting is in our history. Breathe deep, run far, live free and continue to write the stories of our legacy. Our history didn’t give up on our legacy, neither should we. Remember that you are not alone in your battles and that everyone in this world, past, present, and future is tied together by all of our struggles. Though they may come in different shapes and sizes, the problems that we face in this world can be overcome as long as you can remember to at least try, and fight. We are all fighting for the same thing and that is to live our lives.

We are a Legacy. You are a Legacy. The Legacy is Us. 

Author's Note

I want to make all my writings into solid gold. The only way to do this is improve, improve, improve. Feel free to give me your opinions and constructive criticism, but it has to be constructive. Tell me how I can improve it, I'm mature enough to admit that I am only human and can always do better. Also grammatical errors, I know they are there and a few were done on purpose since I envisioned this essay being used as a speech. Bear with me and do your best to help me if you please.

Reviews

[Niki Wilson]

Agree with Ronn with the paragraphs apar from that, good!

[Ronn Michael Salinas]

Life is a noir... I suggest breaking your paragraphs down to smaller pieces for total condescension (the better definition of the word), and change the genre classification maybe? :) just don't hold back, and be careful not to overdo it either. peace.