All the Broken Pieces.
Is it just me, or do you feel it too? That moment when you see someone, either in person or online, and all you see is their completeness, their success, their ever present happiness and their seeming perfection, and all you can do is look at yourself and feel like you are so much less than they are.
I think most of us have felt that way at some point in our lives. We feel like we are in some way wanting, and always will be.
We see ourselves as an accumulation of so many broken pieces.
When I look at where I am in my life, compared to where I thought I would be, I shake my head in wonder. When I consider the kind of husband and father I have become against the ideal that I carry in my head, I want to shrink into a dark corner and stay there for eternity.
When I measure my conduct in the role of son-in-law and brother-in-law, I find myself again wanting.
And I wish I could be ‘whole and complete’; able to show up in the world in the way that I would like to.
But in the quiet moments of my soul, when I leave behind me all the comparisons and judgments, I can see that I am actually doing better than I could have expected.
If I go further, and examine the lives of those who seem to ‘have it all together’, I find a startling truth that leads me both into an attitude of humility, and yet an acceptance of the person I currently am.
Because the successful people are also just an accumulation of broken pieces.
I know a few millionaires, and I can see that their lives are broken in their own ways. I have friends in the fitness space who have incredible physiques, yet who struggle in their intimate relationships.
I know people who seem to be powerful and connected on social media, and yet they struggle with insecurity, doubt and difficulty in the quiet gardens of their soul.
In truth, we are all broken in some way or another.
But that’s enough. The opening gateway on the road to peace begins with a desire to accept yourself for who you really are, and that means acknowledging and accepting that right now a part of you may be broken, insufficient and imperfect, and yet you are still of value.
One of my very favorite books, from which I have learnt so much wisdom, begins by explaining our nobility as a consciousness.
It doesn’t tell us how we are imperfect, because you can still be noble without being ‘whole or perfect’. It then goes on to explain how we can progress towards ‘a less broken state’, while not condemning us for where we are, knowing that the status of being human is enough.
And it helps us to realize deep in our heart that the broken state of our emotions is not a factor of our birthright, nor a judgment of our value, but it is merely a result of travelling through this temporal sphere, where none are whole, and yet all have worth.
Your nobility, your worth, your value have always been the same, and always will be.
( I chose this picture today because the raft you see this person using is nothing more than an accumulation of broken trees.)
— Dr. Alan Barnes
@maddrbmusings