Fatima S.

Photography by Ashley Kung

If you’re reading this, it’s okay for people to come and go.

Sometimes it’s friends, family, or even the person you thought you’d spend your life with. When they leave, it can feel like the world has ended, as if their absence defines you and leaves you incomplete.

However, the truth is, their departure doesn’t erase the love, memories, and impact they had on your life. Even if their chapter in your story concludes, the pieces they gifted you remain. You carry their laughter, words, lessons, love, and even their hurt.

We are all mosaics of the people we’ve loved. Every conversation, moment of joy, and heartbreak leaves behind fragments, shards of color, and pieces of glass that become part of the larger picture. Some pieces are bright, while others are sharp—shimmering with joy or heavy with pain. But together, they create something extraordinary.

This is the most beautiful aspect of life: it means you’re not broken by loss; you’re shaped by it. Every person who has walked with you, no matter how briefly, has added to your strength, depth, and humanity.

So, if you’re hurting right now and grieving someone who has left, remember this: you’re not just the pain of their absence. You’re also the beauty of their presence. You’re not defined by who stayed or who left; you’re defined by how you continue to show up for yourself, carry their pieces, and grow around the cracks.

One day, you’ll look back and realize that even though it hurt and felt like it would destroy you, it didn’t. It built you. It gave you colors and fragments you didn’t have before, making your mosaic more vivid, complex, and irreplaceable.

Perhaps that’s what life is truly about—not keeping everyone forever, but learning to honor the pieces they leave behind.

So, if you feel broken right now, please hear me: you’re not broken. You’re becoming. You’re a mosaic, and every piece—every love, every goodbye—has made you irreplaceable.

Fatima S., University of Florida

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