Sometimes that would be nice. But unfortunately life doesn’t work like that. You can’t just skip over the parts of your story you don’t like. You have to read every line, and meet every character that’s connected to your story, whether you want to or not.

You’re not going to like all of it. Just like a good book, there are always things you won’t like. Things that upset you, make you cry. Things that make you mad. Things you want to change. Things you wish you’d never read because you can’t forget them.

There are things you really enjoy, really love. Things you want to keep reading again and again so you can bask in the moment, and live it forever. Unfortunately, life doesn’t work that way either. Because our story isn’t stagnant. It is ever moving, ever changing.

Each day is a brand new chapter, a continuation from the chapter before, but it’s still new. Because characters change. Their storylines change. One day you’ll be going with them in one direction, and the next day everything has changed, and you’re in a brand new story. Whether you like it or not.

And no matter how much you want to skip the rest of that chapter, you can’t. One chapter leads to the next, and if you skip a chapter, you’ll never understand what’s happening in the new one. And unlike a book, these chapters in life cannot be re-read to better understand the outcome. Because the author of your story keeps writing, and as the new chapters are written, the old ones quickly fade, not to be available again. They become only memories.

You don’t have much to say about how the chapters are written. Sure, you know how you want them to be, but there are other characters in your story that know how they want their story to intersect with yours, and that changes the way your next chapter is written.

There’s another part of this as well. You’re not the only one whose story is being written. Every character who interacts with you in each chapter of your story is also interacting in theirs, and so are you. Because even though you’re the main character in each of your chapters, the people around you are also the main characters in their own chapters, their own stories.

And since so many characters intersect with yours in a daily basis, we’re all connected in some way, and whatever happens in a chapter in your life will eventually affect a lot of other chapters in other people’s lives.

Confusing? Too much to comprehend?

That’s how life is. That’s how each of our chapters are. Day after day is a new adventure. If you didn’t like how the last chapter was written, there’s a new one today.

Don’t skip over it, because it just might be the best one yet!

How do you think your chapter will be written for today?