It seems redundant now, predictable even, to turn on the television and see some awful crime against humanity. Another shooting, another terrorist attack, more people dying by the hands of those filled with hate and emptiness, those who kill in cold blood the people who should have lived many more years.

Of course it's overwhelming, but then we just get numb to it, don't we? We get to the point where we expect some other tragedy to happen and we wonder which big city will be hit next and how many hundreds will be injured with the next fatal blow.

We see this on the news, and we walk out our front doors and try to forget because there are plenty of distractions in our own lives like work, school, family and friends, and it becomes easy to place those negative stories somewhere on the back shelf in our brains for another time.

Besides, we get faced with how tough life is on a daily basis on top of knowing the injustices occurring around the world. We have to face more challenges, more reminders that this life is pretty dang hard.

It hit me in a wave several nights ago, because that's what tends to happen when you store it up and put on a brave face, when you deal with life's hardships bit by bit and brush it off with an "it's fine, that's life" and you roll with the punches until finally it hits a bruise you've been sporting for far too long. Until suddenly it's pulled all it can from you and you're running out of your house to get up, to move, to do something, because sitting is the one thing you can't quite do right now - not when you're so frustrated, not when you're so sad that the sadness is manifesting into angry tears, not when there's so much you want that's out of reach, and not when you're trying your best but you're constantly reminded there's nothing you can do and your mind is screaming that you're helpless.

You'd run too, right?

So there I was. Dodging tourists and local pedestrians giving me odd looks as they saw a girl with a frown, a messy bun, and Ed Sheeran booty shorts booking it to her favorite lookout spot. And then I arrived. And I didn't move for quite a while. I wasn't quite sure what I was doing or if this would even help me at all, but in a world full of crazy and hurt, at least I had this view. And at a still corner of my neighborhood along the seawall overlooking the sunset, I sat barefoot until the street lamps came on, wrapped in an over-sized sweatshirt that I'd pulled over my knees already tucked beneath my chin, just thinking about it all.

The seagulls were oblivious and the docks seemed to be mocking me with their squeaking wood rising and falling with the tide. The people partying on yachts seemed happy, but their music was distant and laughter distorted, and they only had that hour of distraction before they had to enter their real lives again.

And I thought, amidst all this beauty, that it just wasn't fair.

It wasn't fair that we had to move and leave the home we'd just gotten comfortable in.

It wasn't fair that an amazingly kind person got cancer and had to work so hard to just barely afford the treatments.

It wasn't fair that a person could get $20,000 a month without having to work while others are left starving and receive absolutely nothing.

It's not fair that a parent should die before their child and not get the chance to be there at their wedding.

It's not fair that a sibling should be taken from this world before they've reached the age of 21.

It's not fair that a person can be taught to hate their body until they're on the brink of dying.

And it's not fair that a person works so hard, 7 days a week, yet hardly anything happens for them in return.

And then this is when your brain unfiles those news stories you've never truly forgotten about and just like that - you're overwhelmed.

Where was God? Where was He in this chaos and sadness and heartache, and world that didn't seem to care for us, the people who were so desperate to remain positive and light at heart? I could see now why people committed suicide if they had no hope to hold onto, no God to believe in that could carry them through the downright unbearable times.

No one had stopped to talk to me yet, not surprising due to the fact that a sniveling girl was suspiciously alone and may have been homeless, and for that I was grateful, though a part of me almost wished they would. When I had checked multiple times for any late-night dog walkers and the Pokémon GO players had already passed me by, I let myself be broken, letting my hurt go until my cheeks were stained with the same salty water that lapped below me. And I actually spoke out loud:

Where are you God? Why can't you just show your face? Why do you make it so hard to believe in you when I want to, I really want to, but all these terrible things are happening to me, to people I love, to strangers?

I'd only sat there for a bit longer when an older couple approached me, looking out at the same darkened view of the harbor. I kept doing not-so-discreet double takes, silently asking them to leave, or perhaps asking them to stay. They did, and they talked to me, and it was a welcome distraction. The man was boisterous, a little loud like my father, and the wife kept apologizing for him with an "oh let this girl be" though in reality I dreaded them leaving because they were making my sadness a bit, well, better. It turns out, their son was getting married and he was going to propose in the exact same spot I was sitting in two days. The entire family was coming and they were preparing and they were so happy.

They told me the story of how they met that was actually a super chance encounter, and after having an on again/off again romance, they ran into each other years later after being broken up for a while and they'd been married ever since. And it kind of instilled in me this "oh, things do work out sometimes, there is good in this world."

I'd already had a smile on my face, knowing that this conversation wasn't completely random, that they'd crossed paths with me for a reason. And my smile only grew at the soothing reminder:

There is always love.

Yes there is disease and sickness, murder and hate, poverty and hunger.

But there is also love, and there is kindness.

And the two together provide a strength that can not be beaten, even in the darkest of nights.

As they walked away, I asked them one last question, a simple, "Where did you meet?"

And the husband looked back with a smile of his own and replied, "Church."

They didn't know I'd just been crying out to a God who didn't seem to hear me, and they definitely didn't know the effect they had on me, or how much I understood the higher meaning interweaved within their casual conversation, but nevertheless it was a reminder. And a call to be strong and to have faith.

Just when I want to question my beliefs, or feel so broken I feel as though anything good is far, far away from where I stand, He steps in with a nuh uh hunnny. And although I'm not provided with answers for the why's of life, I'm given hope and peace and the strength to live my life without them. And although I can't picture a face behind closed lids, I see my God speak through the people around me and I feel a different kind of answer settle my soul.

In this world full of corruption and greed and awful circumstances that can't be explained, it is still filled with beauty. Yes, it sucks and at times it feels as though it'll never cease being awful. It's easy to harden from the unfairness of it all, but remember, in this life of tragedy don't you dare let this world harden you. Do not let its bitterness enter your heart and trickle into your veins until it spreads like a poison.

Be the person who stands tall, and strong, who feels their heart beating and knows it's for a purpose, who cries but will rise with the new day and smile. Be the person who, no matter how many times gets hurt, no matter what trials are thrown their way - remains to be full of love, joy, generosity, kindness, dreams, and hope.

That is courageous.

That is brave.

Know that there is love out there. That there will always be love in a cold, cruel world and that there are still so many things to see and experience on this Earth so vast - that there are still so many things to live for.

Even if that's just a spectacular sunset and a conversation with passing strangers you may never meet again.