Upgrades.

The apartment building I live in is getting some new upgrades. Right now, they are putting in some new tile flooring in the elevators and main lobby.

The catalyst for a lot of the upgrades being done in my building right now was a fire that happened two years ago.

The fire was on my floor of the apartment building in an adjacent unit. The fire was contained to that unit. Fortunately, I was not in the building at that time.

The fire did a lot of damage - the entire unit was scortched. The man that lived in that unit passed away later that night in the hospital. There was smoke damage to every apartment on my floor that had people evacuate that day. My apartment was smoke-filled for days and I needed to leave the windows and doors open for a long time to air it out. I needed to clean all the surfaces of my apartment.

What did more damage was the water that was used to put out the fire. The elevator wells got flooded. All the apartments on the floors directly below the unit that was on fire were flooded and sustained water damage. People needed to be re-located. Some moved out entirely. All the apartments with damage needed to be renovated. The pool that was in the building has been closed since.

And since the fire, there have been a lot of upgrades to the apartment building - they painted the doors and walls of all the main areas, the pool is getting an upgrade of sorts but we don’t know what it is yet, now the tile floor in the lobby, elevators and presumably, eventually, in the hallways.

Upgrades in our lives happen similarly to what happened in this apartment building. Sometimes there is a catalyst to several life changes, such as a negative or positive event that happens. Othertimes, we are the catalyst that decides we want something different, or to change something in our lives. Often, things need to be taken down, and dismantled before being put together in new and different ways, sometimes making them more beautiful, stronger, or simply just updated.

This feels like the perfect metaphor for what I went through with my self and body since being in a series of car accidents years ago. It was a catalyst that set off a cascade of events within me. That only I could feel. That were only visible to people on the outside who could really see. And through this journey, I’ve learned so many things I did not know about my body, how it works, what it needs, how it feels, what is normal, the vast inner world and connection to something greater that lives inside me. I got an enormous upgrade during this time. On all levels.

Sometimes, it is hard for me to see and appreciate this, as it has been a really challenging journey for me with so much hardship and grief, but there are moments like this one where I see not only what a burden it has been, but what a gift it is. It is the gift that is continuously giving.

I’m listening more intently to myself now, as I am not interested in another catastrophic event to teach me and upgrade my life. So when I see apartment buildings being renovated and upgraded, I take it all the way in and appreciate everything that is in an upgrade, including the catalyst.