Unfinished #1

I feel like I’m broken inside. Like a part of me is missing, and I don’t know what that part is. I feel lost. My life has no purpose. No potential. And I’m dying inside.

I cried last night. I squeezed my eyes shut so the tears wouldn’t show. I kept telling myself, “suck it up, stop crying…you need to be strong.”

This morning I received this email:

You put yourself under tremendous pressure to provide for others, to be strong for them, to never cry, show weakness, doubt, or indecision. Today, explore the ways you have put yourself under this kind of pressure. What would have happened if you were a little easier on yourself? ( As an Enneagram 8)

What would happen if I were a little easier on myself?

I’d fall apart.

I’d fall apart and I’m not sure the pieces of me would fit back together.

I’m out of touch. With myself. With my life. With the world.

And is that my fear of letting go? Would I really fall apart? And if I did fall apart, maybe the pieces are not meant to fit back together. Maybe some pieces of me are broken. Maybe they won’t remain who I become, and I need to let them fall away in order to be remade.

What would happen if I were a little easier on myself?

I don’t know how to live like that. I don’t know if that’s a version of myself I can live with. life is not easy. I mean, I guess I wouldn’t say it’s hard either….but it is, life. It is tiring, exhausting, thrilling, beautiful, wonderful, demanding, stressful…like a swirling black hole. Beautiful, dangerous, and ominous all at once.

What would happen? Where would you even start?

I think I’ve been here before. Feeling so low, it’s almost like you could reach out and touch the darkness. Like I’m hidden inside the depths of my very own soul. And no one can see me. I didn’t think I’d make it out then. But slowly the light crept in.

How did I end up back here again, back in this darkness. This despair. This grueling life which holds no joy.

I didn’t have joy once. I lost it, but one day it came back.

Is this just the cycle of life? Will this always be my story?

My Babe told me I was happier once. He’s right. There was a time, some years, where I was happy.

What happened to me? Where have I gone? Will I ever find my way back?

My way back to that place of light. Where hope lives, and joy abounds.