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Excerpt from LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL
Excerpt from LIFE IS BEAUTIFUL
From Life Is Beautiful by Sarah M. Johnson
Chapter 1 – The Crash
I remember all of the emotions, the trees whipping
by, everything happening so fast, dad yelling, Here we go, and mom
screaming, Stop it. I remember my brother Zachary looking back at me,
his eyes bright with fear as I prayed God please...
I remember the sense of something coming; you know
it’s coming and wonder: will I live?
I remember the violence of the plane plowing into
the ground as we attempted an emergency landing in a roughhewn field...Boom,
boom, boom...and then nothing but an unnerving silence.
I don’t know if I blacked out or merely paused with
my eyes closed in the stillness of those first few moments. Awareness comes
slowly. Then in a rushed breath of shock and revelation, Thank God I’m alive.
My eyes open to an eerily lit silence where
sunlight and shadow intermingle, making it difficult to see into the new
geography of the plane’s interior. My head and body buzz. My mind trips on the
dissonance of dangling upside down, held a few inches from the ceiling of the
plane’s cabin by my seatbelt.
Taking stock of my body, I notice that I peed my
pants and there is a small cut on my left arm. Looking up, I see that one foot
is missing its shoe. My eyes squint into bright sunlight that passes through a
relatively large doorway next to me that was torn open.
The only noise to break the silence is the erratic
popping of electricity; the final groans of a dying airplane.
I move my arms first and then my legs, which causes
small shards of glass to fall from where they’re lodged in my clothes and
upturned seat. I tilt my head back toward the ceiling beneath me and it is
covered in broken glass.
My hair dangles down away from my face, but the
position of my body and the way sunlight cuts through the cabin makes it
difficult to see much of the plane. In those few seconds I realize that I am
okay and begin to think that maybe we are all okay; that the crash wasn’t so
bad.
Interview with Sarah M. Johnson
Your
straightforward, heart-shared account of the tragedy that forever had changed
your life is titled with a most upbeat slant: why is life beautiful? Can it be
for others who also have suffered severity?
The phrase “life is beautiful” has two meanings to me;
first, my brother’s favorite song was “Life is Beautiful” by Sixx A.M. My
brother and I had a moment together, which I share in my book, when we were
sitting in his car at night and he told me to listen to this song. He said,
“Sarah, listen to this song, it is me…” I listened to that song, with my
brother sitting beside me, and really thought of him differently. I thought of
him more deeply, misunderstood, and it was in that moment a rush of compassion
and love fled to him. I don’t think my brother knew how to communicate his
deepest thoughts and emotions, and music was a way for him to understand
himself and allow others to understand him as well.
Secondly, the moment I gave birth to my daughter, Lillian,
I realized life is beautiful. I gave birth to my daughter when I was 22, only
three years after the airplane crash. In those three years, I had met my future
husband, attended college, and continued to grieve the loss of my father and
brother. The moment I saw my daughter and held her for the first time, all the
feelings of depression, anxiety, grief, substance abuse had faded. It was like
my father and brother had sacrificed their lives for my little girl. She was
absolutely perfect, so beautiful.
I believe there is a Divine Intervention for EVERYTHING. Without
the airplane crash, without my dad’s drug use, without all the ugliness I had
faced in such a short life, I would have never met my future husband and gave
birth to my daughter, and truly saw the beauty life has to offer.
I think to see the beauty in life; however, one must first
CHOOSE to see the beauty. I really do believe others who have suffered
severity/adversity, have the personal choice to see that life is
beautiful. But, it takes
acceptance to know one’s life is not what they want and to reach out and do
something about it. I think life is what you make it; and if you don’t do the
work, attempt to start life over; you may miss the opportunity to see that life
beautiful.
You were
19 when the plane crashed. Looking back with the hindsight of strengthening
your walk with God, plus the professional knowledge of social work and the desire
to counsel others, what positive ways do you view that the young adult Sarah
back then handled things?
I think young adult Sarah really did the best she could. Young
Sarah was raised by parents who were addicted to substances. She unconsciously
learned to numb pain with either alcohol or drugs. She also learned that reaching
out for help was forbidden. As I look back, I am proud that Young Sarah accepted
help when it was offered. She got into therapy, went to outpatient treatment,
attended a youth group, and leaned on God. I am proud Young Sarah never gave
up, I am proud Young Sarah knew things would get better; because in her heart
she always knew there was something bigger for her; God had bigger plans for
her than she could even comprehend in those moments.
Today, I have a Master’s Degree in Marriage and Family
Therapy. I know we all do the best we can with what we have learned from our
parents/caregivers. I did the best I could. But I also took a risk, which is
what was different than what I was taught from my parents. I leaned on the HOPE
that God had a plan for me. This faith came to me, as I also explain in the
book, when I took hands with a young man I was dating at the time. As I took
his hands, I was sucked into a channel, a white wormhole; something I cannot
describe other than God’s Light… it was in that moment I saw God (or whatever
He was showing me) and KNEW with all my heart and soul there was something
watching over me, something I was supposed to see.
It was me experiencing God that night that gave me faith
and HOPE for my future. I think my future would have been a lot different if I
did not experience/witness God. As I mentioned before, I believe in Divine
Interventions. I was right where I was supposed to be that night in November
2007, less than one year before the airplane crash, and that experience is
something I relied on to get better.
In your
book you discuss the emotional themes of the missing-dad-syndrome, guilt,
betrayal by family members, and drug use by family. What’s the first step for
someone who wants to step over these troubling issues and detangle from a
dysfunctional family, or does one have to learn to live with these issues?
The first step in detangling from a dysfunctional family
is recognizing the family is dysfunctional! Every family is dysfunctional to
some degree, but when there is drug addiction, alcoholism, abuse, neglect,
infidelity, fraud, etc., this raises the level of dysfunction.
I wanted to break away from the dysfunction, but first I
needed to recognize and find who I really was and ACCEPT who and what I came
from. It is okay not to come from the “perfect family” because they don’t
exist. But what I needed to really work on was accepting my family for what it
was and becoming a better person because of it.
We can detangle and learn to live with dysfunction. But I
think detaching ourselves from the dysfunction is the best thing we can do if
we want to move forward. We can be around our families and still be detached. We
can learn not to take things personally, stay out of the gossip, choosing not
to drink with the family, but also recognizing we are changing patterns,
patterns of generational dysfunction.
One of
the nurses told you that rather than dying in the plane crash that you’d been
“saved for a reason” and that “You have a lot to accomplish in this world. You
just don’t realize it right now.” Was this a haunting pressure or the fuel to
drive you forward? How can others make this work for themselves?
It was FUEL to drive me forward! I believed in my heart I
had survived for a reason and I did have a lot to accomplish in this world. The
nurse telling me this was only reassurance of what I already knew it my heart.
As for others, I think people tell us things to reassure
us of things we already know/believe about ourselves. I believe in the Law of
Attraction, so things are said to us or people are put in our lives for a
reason. I think the reason is for us to become better individuals and to live
for our destined purpose.
LISTEN to what others are saying to you, good or bad, they
are telling us for a reason… so we can be better individuals to move towards
our purpose.
Your
father had trouble with drugs. And alcohol was a problem for you both prior to
and after the accident. Yet, you wrote about how you both found redemption in
mission work. Why do you believe its human nature to seek redemption?
Dad had previously done mission work in Africa with my
brother. Guatemala was going to be
my first time experiencing missions work.
I believe it is human nature to seek redemption because we
all want to be good. I think it is really easy to carry around shame and guilt about
ourselves which can ruin our lives. I believe what we believe about ourselves
is what we attract in the world. I was surrounding myself with people who also
felt the same way about themselves and shared similar behaviors.
After the crash, once I started therapy with Pauline Boss,
entered outpatient treatment, and started school again; I was starting to feel
good about myself. I was dedicated to God and relied on the hope I was going to
be fine. I was starting to attract positive, healthy people in my life. I was
starting to detach from my dysfunctional family. I ended toxic relationships. I
was moving forward with my life… I was seeking redemption. And the redemption
felt GOOD.
People seek redemption because it moves them closer toward
their destined purpose. Redemption establishes happiness and positive
self-worth. Redemption is God. I believe the closer we are to redemption, the
closer our relationship with God becomes. Which, many of us know, God is love.
Everyone wants love. And, that’s why it’s human nature to seek redemption.
In your
sessions with Dr. Pauline Boss you learned about “Ambiguous loss;” that is,
loving someone who can’t give back (such as an absentee parent). Any advice for
those who may struggle with this situation?
Acceptance, acceptance, acceptance.
Through all
the loss I have experienced, the deaths of uncles, my aunt, and my dad and
brother, the ambiguous loss of my mother has been the most difficult loss for
me. My mother is alive and for the most part well. However, she is a distant
stranger who I have yearned for. I have yearned to have her care, love, and
accept me for me. Fortunately, my mother loves me, but is unable to provide
“motherly qualities” to me. It has taken me YEARS to accept my mother for who
she is and to let go of the feelings of needs and wanting more from her.
Working with a therapist, reading, praying and meditating,
has helped me work through this loss. I have learned to accept individuals,
especially my mother, for who she is. I cannot change her, nor do I really want
to. I cannot change people. I must accept them for who they are. Only I can
control me.
For individuals who are struggling with this situation, I
advise them to ACCEPT their situation. Stop being the victim in your own life
and take responsibility for yourself. If our parent has done something that has
hurt us, this can only make us stronger individuals. I think having compassion
for our parent(s) and recognizing they are really doing the best they know how
can bring us ease.
One of
your conclusions in the book centers on the choice of doing the work, or not,
to move forward in life in an attempt to start life over. Why is this?
I believe certain circumstances occur in our life so we
can start life over. Circumstances such as death, divorce, job loss,
illness/disease are there for us TO start life over. However, we must use the
circumstance as life lessons – and I think that is what the work is. It is
working through the circumstance, questioning it, analyzing it, learning from
it, and moving forward. I believe adversity builds hope. Bad things happen to
us, things we just don’t understand, so we can become better individuals and
move closer towards our destined purpose.
God has given us free will. We have the choice to do the
work or not. We have the choice to
conquer our adversity or let the adversity beat us. The first step, once again,
is accepting the adversity/circumstance and using it as a life lesson to become
the best we can be.
If we don’t do the work, and attempt to start life over,
we may miss the opportunity to see that life is beautiful.
Sarah's Ah-hahs To Tweet:
Imagine having huge stress, then surviving a plane crash?
Exclusive interview with @SarahMJohnson12 (Tweet
This)
Everyone’s Story: @SarahMJohnson12 shares why life is
beautiful despite #adversity. #BookGiveaway (Tweet
This)
Drugs, alcohol, family loss, an airplane crash, yet
@SarahMJohnson12 says life’s beautiful. See why. (Tweet
This)
Authors' Bio:
Sarah M. Johnson is
currently a graduate student seeking her Marriage and Family Therapy degree.
She will graduate in 2015 and plans to open up a private practice and guide
those who are seeking their own self-discoveries of love and happiness. Life is Beautiful was released on
August 25, 2015. It is available on Amazon
and Barnes
& Noble.
Places to connect with Sarah:
