Letting the Fire Reshape Our Lives: What Will You Create?

The difference between a good life and a bad life
is how well you walk through the fire.
~Carl Jung

I know how many of you are unhappy. The pain still weighs heavy. The days cast a shadow. Joy feels slippery. 
And though the flames might no longer encircle you, you can still feel their heat. You're not out of the fire yet.
Fire is nothing to be trifled with. It decimates centuries of old-growth trees, it razes entire cities, it kills.
But it also shapes. Fire, of course, forges steel. And so it's possible to use this time of walking through the fire to reshape our lives. 
I know. It's hard enough to get to work, keep the fridge full, and ensure you don't run out of tear-proof mascara. But stay with me for a minute. Cause the people I know who've come out of this fire with lives they love are those who've used it to create necessary but sometimes long-resisted change.
Cause when it's all burned to the ground, it's time for new growth. And that includes you.
Not all at once, of course. No need to tell off your boss, quit your job, sell your house, and finally give your mother-in-law a piece of your mind all in one day.
Instead, as the old adage about eating an elephant goes, you do it one bite at a time. Forget, for the moment, that your marriage feels like it's hanging by a thread: How's the rest of your life going for you? Even before D-Day, did you spring out of bed, excited about the day ahead? Or did life feel like a slog? Did days end with a sigh or relief or ease? 
Ask yourself: Whether or not my marriage survives, what do I want my life to look like? Who do I want to be? How do I want to live? We know you can't control him, right? But you can control you. And that, as we discover through this, is enough.
One friend of mine, whose husband left her for the OW, carved out a new career. She sounds like a warrior, doesn't she? She is. But she's also someone who sat on a park bench, not long after D-Day, considering how best to kill herself. She believed, in that darkness, that everyone would be better off without her. The fire was too much. Except that it wasn't. Not for her. Not for someone willing to walk through it. 
She began to wonder what her reshaped life would look like after surveying the ruins of her marriage – the one she thought would keep her safe, the one that she had trusted to support her as she raised their special-needs child – and realizing that nobody was coming to rescue her. She sent out loads of applications, told everyone she knew that she was looking for a new career, and now loves her job, her family is thriving, and her ex? Well, who cares how he's doing? 
Not all of the reshaping looks so dramatic. Sometimes it's about taking stock of your life and realizing your friends really suck. They make you feel bad about yourself, they gossip about others, and they are nowhere to be seen when you're hurting. Maybe the fire is about reshaping your friendships – spending less time with those people so there's more time for people who make you feel good.
Often (as in almost always), it's about learning how to set and enforce clear boundaries in our lives. No longer agreeing to host in-laws who routinely disrespect you. Refusing to reconcile with a guy who won't go to therapy. 
Sometimes the reshaping is literal. Realizing you've put your health on the back burner while you took care off everyone else. Maybe the fire is about reminding you to prioritize yourself. Three-times-a-week gym visits, a running partner, daily hikes. 
Maybe it's about breathing life into an old dream. Remember how you used to love sewing clothes for your dolls? Or making earrings from polished stones? Or doodling in notebooks? Or writing song lyrics? Or sailing? Or gardening? Or... Or... Or...? What happened to that girl? Oh right. She became so busy making sure everybody else was chasing their dreams that she forgot she had any. 
What if the fire helped shape those dreams? I'm not saying you have to create your own Etsy store (though, why not?). I'm just asking you to make space in your life for what you love too. No asking for permission. No I'll-do-it-when-the-kids-are-grown. Step at a time. 
My point is this: Betrayal surrounds us fire whether we choose it or not. And, as Jung points out, the difference between a good life and a bad one is what we do with that fire. It can consume us or it can burn down the old to inspire new growth. 
What will you create in its wake?