Damaged

Labeling yourself as "damaged" or "broken" and allowing that define who you are is relatively easy. Once you've seen rock bottom, felt utterly alone, and believed yourself completely worthless, being broken seems like a vast improvement and a touch like a coping mechanism. Eventually, it's much more than comfortable... some where close to a security blanket. It's safe, warm, and seems honest. Self-identifying as "damaged" becomes the constant in the chaos, noise, and instability of life.

You can use it as an excuse for bad behavior. Because being "broken" and "damaged" makes it incredibly easy to be self-centered under the guise of self-preservation.

You can wear it like a badge that helps makes your walls darker, higher, and more imposing. It often wards off those who may consider getting to close.

Some are content to wear that badge for life.

Some begin to notice that they're not the only ones who've been through hell and lived to tell about it. And, maybe, just maybe, we could figure out how to have some semblance of security WITHOUT calling ourselves "broken."
But what does that really look like? I mean, REALLY look like?

I've seen happiness from a distance and experienced some glimmers of goodness here and there through my life but sometimes I'm not sure I know enough of joy to be able to identify it in myself. You know, without all the "broken" and "damaged" crap.

There's been times when I've been okay and some moments when I've been close to good but up to this point, I've never fully let go of believing that I am damaged. Irrevocably.

I've always believed that I was some how deserving of all the shit I've been through and earned all the bad that's happened to me, that maybe I never really had a chance at anything close to a good life. I wasn't so sure that I was deserving of good... that it was possible for anyone to actually love me instead of just feeling sorry for me. The loneliness and emptiness that comes with those beliefs make calling yourself damaged feel the stinging relief that comes when pressure is applied to a gushing wound.

But this week, I find myself realizing that I really didn't "deserve" any of it and I didn't DO anything to earn it either. I just experienced it. Maybe I'm not actually damaged. A little broken, yes. But breaks heal. Bruises fade.

When I was young, I used to believe in happily ever afters and that all my dreams really could come true but I gave all that up when I began to wear "damaged" like badge.
I'm finding picking those dreams back up a lot harder than putting that badge on was. Why is it that choosing light feels a lot like training for your first Ironman (not that I'd actually know what that's like...)?
Maybe our minds need endurance training much like our bodies do. If we look hard enough, we can see that even on our trek through hell, scattered moments of mercy or relief existed. We have the power to create them for ourselves and others if we train our minds. And maybe, eventually, we'll quit feeling off balance missing the badge we should have never worn in the first place.

I have come to a place where I have to choose to let all the broken-ness swallow me up or really and truly, for the first time ever, figure out how to let it all go.

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