healing...

Dear Authentic Girl,

Your heart will mend, it will. It always always will, no matter how many times it has been broken. Sometimes our hearts have to be broken to be made into something newer, stronger, and wiser. Sometimes the cracks that a broken heart makes and leaves are the very portals to the greatest light and love and learning that we will ever experience.

Having our hearts broken is a part of life. It just is. Anyone who lives and loves with all of their heart, or even with parts of their heart, is destined to experience the breaking of that heart at one time or another.

Be with those feelings. Don't rush the healing time. Let it go at its own pace and certainly don't shove those feelings into some faux hiding place, believing that what is out of sight is out of mind.

Broken hearts have a lot to say, and the more patient you are to listen, the faster your heart will heal. Listen to what your broken heart is saying about how it wants life to be in the future.

Be patient and gentle with yourself. No rushing. Rushing a broken heart is a bit unkind and impatient. You don't want to treat yourself that way!

You are so loved. You are so wise and wonderful and amazing.

You are healing right now.

xoxo

It's amazing how something so random can speak to you at the exact moment you need to hear it. I received this email as a part of a Brave Girls Club newsletter that I subscribe to. It came to me in May of this year. It made me cry... I have said before that having your heart broken for the first time at 34 is really hard...really really REALLY hard! These words hit me like a hammer, they were being nailed to my heart, helping to repair the cracks and the broken pieces of a love that I had held so dear. It became clear to me that this was part of God's plan. I realized that God was making my divorce take for.ev.er. for a reason. I needed to start the healing process before it was over, and my healing process took a very long time to start. I grieved for my marriage...I still do...but my grief had a very long road to travel. Up and down, back and forth, around and around and around. God knew that if my divorce was rushed that I wouldn't be able to cope with the sheer magnitude of all that was going on in my life. It happened in His time...18 months time. I realize that that may not be long as far as some divorces go, but it felt like an eternity to me. But I needed that eternity to get myself and my heart prepared for the next step.

My heart is in a good place right now. Quite peaceful and abundantly thankful. God has surrounded me with the greatest people on the earth. Amazing family, true friends, and those three little souls that make every day worth living. I am trying to wait patiently for God's plan for my new life to unfold. Patient waiting has never been one of my strong points... what keeps me going is knowing that I am not in control and that God is not troubled or worried about where my life is going. He is holding the directions. I couldn't have asked for a better navigator. I am happy, my children are happy, I have a home, a job, a future...I can't say it enough...I am blessed!!! I look back now to the point at the beginning of this journey where I thought that I had used up all of my blessings and that God was angry with me for not being good enough. What a desperate place. I am so thankful to have made it through that agonizing time. My pastor, my counselor, my family and my friends all knew better and helped me to realize that my blessings were just beginning.

My heart may have been broken, but it is healing nicely. There will be a nasty, ugly scar for sure, but that will fade with time and it will make my heart that much stronger.