I have always been the type of person to wear something because I like it, not because it’s the “cool thing to do.” I have worn those rubber bracelets around my wrist since I was younger, mostly to support a different cause, but also partly because I always though they were cool. When Lokai came out with their bands, I was intrigued to say the least. A bracelet that has water from Mount Everest and dirt from the Dead Sea, what’s not to like about that? Actual artifacts from the highest and lowest points in the world, how cool is that?

But when it first got popular, the bracelets where nowhere to be found. You could only order them online or get really lucky with a store that actually supplied them, but this was insanely rare for the area I lived in. At that point in my life online shopping scared me a bit, not to mention funds were a little non existent. If only I had the same theory now, my wallet would be a bit bigger, so purchasing one online was also out of the question. On one beach trip, I finally found a little shop that physically sold these Lokai bracelets, and I made sure to snatch one up ASAP.

You see, at this point in my life, I was at probably the lowest point I had ever endured. My paps had just passed away from a short yet hard fought battle with lung cancer, and my world was upside down. I didn’t know what to think, how to act or what to believe. My world was just one confusing mess, and I didn’t know where to go from there. So when I got my Lokai, I got it for multiple reasons, the biggest being it reminded me of one thing, to enjoy the highest of highs, but the lows will always get better.

When I look at whichever Lokai bracelets, I may be wearing at any given day, one original, one pink for breast cancer or the multicolored for Make A Wish Foundation, I’m reminded of that time I felt so lost. However, I am also reminded of that time when I was wearing the Lokais at my greatest points in my life, like when I won the championships for my middle school basketball team and my middle school softball teams as a coach, when my brother graduated high school, and when Sam Smith absolutely left me in awe that one time at his concert.

I also wear it because clear or white signifies lung cancer awareness, which is coincidentally the same color of the original Lokai bracelets. So I wear the Lokai and replace my broken Lokais because it has a dual purpose. I wear them to remind me life is forever changing, forever evolving to different challenges and highs. But it also helps me in my way to bring awareness to the disease that started this all.

So while wearing a Lokai bracelet might not be considered the “in” thing to do, I don’t care. I don’t do things to be cool; I do it for me. So until I feel like I don’t need to wear a Lokai bracelet, one will forever be secured around my wrist in the highs of my life and the lows of my life, to constantly remind me I will make it through the storm in due time. Times in your life may seem unbearable; you may feel like your world is crumbling, but you can always make it through on the other side. Sometimes when I feel like the walls may be closing in, like my world has been greatly altered, I look to my wrist and remember whatever I’m going through isn’t as bad as it seems.