heart issues

“The most authentic thing about us is our capacity to create, to overcome, to endure, to transform, to love and to be greater than our suffering.”

Ben Okri

I’ve had a post-it note sitting in a note holder on my desk for the past several weeks. I look at it every time I sit down to work. It simply says, “break down or break open”. I think it is a profound saying. One thing I know is that to fully engaged in life means encountering difficulty and suffering. Sometimes that is due to the loss of someone in our life – maybe through death, maybe through divorce, maybe through abandonment.

We can be hurt by others. Through their actions or words, they tell us that we are not enough, that we are not worthy, that we are not wanted, that we are not included, that we are not needed.
Sometimes our suffering is through our own choices. We willingly and wantonly choose what God would not have for us and then reap the consequences.

And sometimes, suffering comes to us through illness and on-going health challenges – our own or in those we love.
In all these circumstances we have a choice. We can either allow our heart to ‘break down’ or to ‘break open’. ‘Breaking down’ means pulling away, closing off and living in a state of dis-integration. To ‘break open’ means moving towards, opening up and allowing for deeper and deeper integration. Breaking open means we are trusting God’s work in our lives, no matter what may happen. We are willing to trust that our hearts will be enlarged by our suffering…that through our suffering we can become people known for our deep compassion, generous love and capacity for forgiveness.

What struggle are you dealing with right now? As you consider the idea of breaking down or breaking open, where do you find yourself? If you tend to ‘break down’, what could you do today to allow your heart to ‘break open’ and encounter God’s love, grace and transformation in the midst of the suffering?

Grace and peace,
Deb

Photo by Charlotte Dee
http://www.flickr.com/photos/66517237@N04/6377650365/