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Typically before a story like this you’d say “Close your eyes and visualize this.” But since it’s a blog, I won’t do that. But visualize it. With your eyes open.

So you’re walking down a hall. It’s a big hall. Lots of doors in it. The hall is so long, you can’t see the end of it.  Some doors are closed, and others are wide open. Some of the closed doors will be opened if you knock, others will not.  You walk through an open door.  Through this door is another hall. Smaller this time. But still too big for you to see everything. Fewer doors, but still lots of them.  Some of these are open, and some of these are closed. You walk through another open door, and see yet more doors. Eventually, after walking through a few more doors you find yourself back in the first hallway.  As you walked through one of the doorways, you got a cut on your arm. You bandage it up, and it heals.

You continue on, making decisions as to which doors to walk through. Some you knock on. You get denied entry. Some let you through. You eventually get a gash on your head from one of the doorways. Deep this time. It heals, but leaves some scarring.  You continue walking through different doors making decisions of which ones to enter. You find a locked door, but this door has something unique about it. It looks different than any door you’ve seen in this hallway yet. It’s locked. You really want to see what’s past this door. You force it open. Once inside you are astonished at what you see. You don’t know what to do. You panic and head for the door you came through. But it’s closed behind you. You must procede forward. Eventually, you find the main hall again. This path left you seriously injured. Your arm will always have this scar. It will continually remind you of the door you forced open every time you check the time on your watch.

Some doors lead you through paths that are shortcuts down the long hall. Other doors lead you backwards, towards where you came from.

You come across another door. It’s an open door this time. But there is something special about this door. You are drawn to it. Not just because it is open, but because of a good feeling you get around this door. It makes you happy. You smile upon entering. At first when you enter you are very happy you walked through the door. Good things are inside. This happiness lasts for some time. Minutes, hours, days, maybe even months. But then you continue to walk through subsequent doors. You get hurt as you walk through the maze of doors that take you to the main hallway. You find yourself at a place shortly before where you walked through the last door off of the main hallway. You can see it in the distance. It looks closed. You continue to walk down the path.

You notice that some doors that were closed before are now open. You choose some of them. After walking through some of these doors, and through the doors that follow, you become a stronger person.  You continue your path down the main hallway.

Eventually, you see the door that you were so drawn to previously. It is open, not closed as expected. As you approach the door, it seems to be filled with happiness again. You see no sign of the previously caused pain. You see nothing that will cause it again. You walk through the door again. Things are happy. You think things have changed. Suddenly, another door opens, and you get pushed through it. Not what you expected. Not something you planned for. You got hurt badly this time. Was it something deep? Perhaps some damage to the heart. You will be okay. Healing will take some time. But eventually, you find yourself walking down that main hallway again.

When on the left, you spot that one special door. You are drawn to it still. You look in carefully. Peering ever so slowly around the corner.  You don’t know what you expect to see inside. As you peer in, without entering, you see no sign of pain. No sign of things that will cause pain. And the things inside the door look so wonderful.

Do you walk through the door?