As we fumble our way through the painful parts of life, we often leave bits and pieces of our aching selves by the side of the road. Sometimes it’s because we don’t have the tools to work through the pain or we don’t have the space in our lives to face the hurt, but sometimes we just don’t want to. Slogging through pain, shame, guilt, fear, or whatever lovely gifts are left over from our time of suffering sucks. Like sucks hard. But sadly, when we abandon parts of ourselves to live a life that is “enough” we eventually hit a wall called “but I want more”. I want more love, trust, abundance, faith, courage, fill in whatever word you like but the more is found in the pieces of yourself you left behind.
I’ve left a lot of Brandi pieces along the side of the road. It’s been easier to abandon her then feel all the shame and hurt that are left over from a childhood where my father left too soon and my stepfather stayed too long. But I’m starting to break a little. Maybe more than a little. Break down or break open I’m not quite sure but I have a sneaky suspicion they’re really the same thing. I need to become whole again because I want a life where I can really trust in love. Feel the excitement of love. Show up to love with a heart full of hope. And the only place I’m going to find that trust, excitement, and hope is in the pieces of me I left behind. The younger me who isn’t battle weary but can see love as the gift it really is and not just a way to be hurt and abandoned.
I have an amazing love in my life who is doing his very best to show up as vulnerable as he can and all I do is keep raising the bar of what I “need”. Unfortunately, reaching this bar is unachievable because I’ve designed it that way. I’m figuring out that I’ve never been able to fully trust in our love and that I keep raising that bar so that at some point he’ll say screw it and give up (which is doubtful) and it’ll prove to me that no love is safe. That I was right all along and even the most incredible men will hurt me and leave me in the end. Then I can continue to abandon my younger self and never have to feel all the awful, unresolved feelings.
So here I am hoping I’ll be able to gather all those pieces of young Brandi I’ve scattered on my path and that when I find them, I’ll know what to do with them. That young Brandi can forgive me and teach me how to show up to love with hope and not with my runners on. Somewhere inside of me I already know that my love is the kind of person I can trust wholeheartedly; it’s me I’m not so sure of. I need to stop trying to control every movement of our love because I’m scared of being hurt and abandoned. The truth is that I abandoned myself long before he came along and no one can hurt me as much as I’ve hurt myself.
So lovely readers, here’s to hoping we can give ourselves enough grace to sit in our own pain with an open heart and become whole again.
