Finding the Cure

I had a heart that was designed to love, in a world that was designed to stop it.

I knew as a very young girl that all I wanted to do was love people. I knew that all I wanted to do was be a friend and make other's happy. It was easy at first, when our friends only want simple things. When they want a CD for their birthday or a slumber party on a trampoline? Those things are easy to provide. But when requests get loftier and one persons wants are conflicting with another's, that's when choices have to be made. I've never been good at hurting people, I've always had a soft spot for the broken. What I understand now, though, is that if you spend all your time with broken people, unwilling to be fixed, you'll start to view yourself as broken too.

There are things in this life we go through,  things that hurt is, thicken our skin, and sometimes damage our self-image, but nothing can truly break us. That is what I understand now. We can choose to be broken, or we can choose to pick up and press forward. The trick is, we have to choose. I would give my life to make others happy. But, in having that mindset, I've actually hurt more people than I've pleased. All the while, I was putting my journey on hold and postponing the most important part of this life; I was postponing the part in which I discover who I am, and what motivates me.

Is my motivation to make others happy driven by a desire to simply make a difference? Or is it more selfish? Is it that I was seeking approval, no matter what I had to do to get it? I know now it isn't the approval aspect,  as I have never worried about gaining approval, but rather gaining and sharing love. My motive to try and make others happy was more derived from an overwhelming desire to share love with everyone. Sometimes, though, we need to hold that love back and not trust everyone with it.

I suppose it was because I saw a lot of kids growing up who didn't have love in their homes, and I saw many families struggling to even share a kind word. Mine wasn't like that. We had our ups and downs, we had some hard times, but the core of everything was love. My brothers were my best friends and my mom was my confident. My dad was, and always will be the strong provider and the person who quietly understands my heart the most, under his thick skin.

What this time has taught me is that I can't simply give my heart to everyone and I can't expect everyone to accept or embrace choices I make in my life. But, what I can do is love the people who are placed in my life and love them with all that I have. I can love others from a distance, and keeps those that matter close. If I strengthen the bonds I do have, and spread love in that way, then some way or another it will make a difference. Some way or another it will be the light in someone's dark place and the strength in their weakest moments.  I suppose my real desire,  then, was to make a difference. That is why I went after so many broken people in my life and why I would stop everything to try and fix them. If I was able to be their light,  then maybe, just maybe, that would fix things in me.

But, at the end of it all, I was the only one who could fix me, and I'm finally happy to say I have taken the right turns to get there.  Just like it is up to everyone else to fix themselves. Not from being broken, because we are never truly broken, but just a little mixed up and in need of fine tuning.

Anyway, just rambling.

Cheers.