seeing through shattered glass

"Focus on how far you have come, not how far you have to go. You will find help in unexpected places." - Jody Bergsma

✒ Broken, shattered, all my sharpness & points jutting out at awkward angles. It's no longer perfect, clear, a flat surface for the light to pour through. I am that damaged glass window. The one that used to reveal the morning light in smudge-free glory...now I cannot even hold myself together. It happened suddenly, like a brick getting thrown into me, point blank. There was no single crack that later split & slowly traveled outward wreaking havoc. It was a single blow that took me out.

No, maybe that isn't even the whole truth, for I'm sure, if looked at closer, one could spot the hairline fractures forming in blooms over the years; like spider webs building up in the corner of a home. Yet I chose to look away, to not notice how shabby that window had become. Until the day when all the little scratches & scuffs didn't matter, because there was a gaping hole torn through the center of me.

That's where I thought I had remained. Shattered glass everywhere.

I never realized how much I've healed since, because I expected to go back to that crisp window pane, but my spirit had other plans for me. In the dead of night, during the darkest hours, where the chill winds swept through & shook the remaining shards free, that's when the real healing took place - no sooner. I didn't notice at first, the process was long & painful. In fact, I didn't even fully see what I had become in that darkness, within the shadows. Slowly, piece by shattered piece I was reborn, yet not as I had imagined.

As I see my reflection now - I still see me, see all the broken bits, the sharp & twisted edges, the fine splinters of glass slotted between these chunks of jagged frame & colored surface I barely recognized - I'm still me, just different. I've become this mosaic of fragmented bits of self, held together by something newer, stronger. There are shifts in color & texture that I never beheld before, creating a new image, something I'm beginning to recognize, but have trouble identifying at times.

One thing remains true to self, however, and that is I'm still able to let light through. In fact, as the morning sun-rays come slanting past this remade self image, I'm seeing it come alive, bouncing upon edges & contours of rose, emerald, gold, ruby & ocean blue. It dances across the floorboards of my heart, pooling warmth back into my soul. I'm starting to see the intricate way my spirit has mended & am beginning to fall in love again with this imperfectly perfect reflection.

So...If I am to be loved again, to let myself be loved again...then they won't be expecting a perfect new window. Perhaps, maybe, they will be the same ~ a kaleidoscope of broken colors swirling & tumbling around one another creating something totally new & rare.

Dare I call this brokenness...beauty?

Yet we'll still be whole, we'll still be 'us'...as I am still me. As ever, I'll allow the sun shine through my many fragments, each casting the light about in leaps & bold particles, shifting into something so much more...yes, beautiful...than I ever imagined I'd become. I see me now, I see this artwork, this newness birthed from my old, and I love her.

#Journaling #SoulSpeak #InnerGrowth #ShatteredGlass