Today I decided to watch a streamer, who I watch every night, play a new game that I had never heard of. It was called Before Your Eyes. You may be wondering what does that have to do with anything? Just a game I happened to watch? Hey, I didn’t expect anything either, but little did I know.
The game happened to be about a boy's life, set up like a movie, that you just happen to be playing through. It starts out after he died, then the game takes you through his life, at least you assume so. Benjamin has a great life, a rough start, he happens to get really sick for a year, but nonetheless his life goes on, and he becomes a professional artist. His mom dies as Benjamin’s art career kicks off. You’d think that would be the saddest part, right? Not at all.
After we go through his life and see him get rich and famous through his art, the game sends us back to the beginning. The game has us (the players) tell back the story of Benjamin’s life, what we saw it was, that is. But then we come to find out it was all a lie. Benjamin didn’t become a professional artist, he didn’t even live a long life at all.
The game makes us go back through Benjamin’s life, except it doesn’t skip all the bad memories this time. We see conversations between his parents, talking about his illness, and that his condition was getting worse and worse. We get stuck at age eleven. He got sick at age eleven. When we first were taken through Benjamin’s “life,” he was only sick for a year. That was it, it was never talked about again. But, that was, in fact, not the truth.
Now we are taken through his illness. Day by day, see Benjamin lay in bed, eat his sandwich, take his pills, and pain medication. He begins to write a story about himself, with a typewriter his mother gave him. His parents were very alarmed by his first story.
It read, “Benjamin Brynn was a loser… he was the worst Brynn to live. He didn’t even try to fight the disease inside him. He just laid down and died.”
His mom wrote Benjamin a letter back, except she calls it, “The Great Life of Benjamin Brynn.” She says, “He got sick for a whole year at age eleven, and was forced to stay inside, so he made up a story of the great life he thought he wanted, which only made him forget the great life he already had.” She goes on to say, “He had filled a new home with light, joy, and promise. How he met his neighbor, who felt all alone in the world, and made her feel okay again. How, even though he was sick, he still gave his parents hope. How he reminded them of who they were, after they had almost forgotten. So when he was going to go, he was okay, because he had already lived a great life. A full life. And he was everything he needed to be.”
After the letter from his mom, he was taken back to present time, and accepted by “the gatekeeper.” I’m sure this game has plenty of interpretations, and isn’t meant to be necessarily “relatable” but more so a sad story with a good lesson. Although, I knew once we got to the telling of the boys real story, that this game was about to hit me hard.
The boy was left in bed all day, taking his pills and painkillers, with his typewriter. Writing the story of the life he has, versus the life he thought he could have, the life he wishes he could have had.
It really hit me, that maybe what you wish your life could be, isn’t what you need your life to be. Even though you seem like a failure, like you are not living up to what you truly could be, you are right where you are supposed to be.
I really took this to heart, to be honest, I am in the same situation as the sick boy. I may not be on the verge of death, as far as we know, but I am sick, stuck in bed, living the same day over and over, feeling empty, defeated. I have to be honest I’ve been feeling pretty bad about myself lately. I don’t feel like I’m living up to what my life could be, I’m feeling like a big failure. Although that must not be the case. I’m exactly where I need to be.
I may not see it, and I may not like it, but I am right where I need to be. I know that God would not put me on this earth to not fulfill something. Whether I live one more month or 80 more years, I am everything I need to be. One day I know I will be able to look back on my life, and realize I didn’t need to make up some crazy story of what I wish my life could have been, but appreciated what my life really was, what it was meant to be.
I am writing this right now, at four in the morning, after bawling my eyes out for an hour, all over a video game. I find it crazy how I just happened to be on twitch tonight, click on my favorite streamers live, who just happened to be playing a game that was going to hit so close to home. It truly was meant to be.
And that is why I decided to write this blog, and perhaps the reason you are reading it right now. You are right where you are meant to be, no matter what you may think. No matter what you wish your life could be, how much you wish you could change it, how much you think you’ve failed, you are where you need to be.
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