Valentine’s Day & shame.
Audrey here.
It's Valentine's Day, and our friend Joy Williams posted a line of Rumi’s that stopped me in my tracks. “Your task is not to seek for love, but merely to seek and find all the barriers within yourself that you have built against it.” When we experience heartbreak or rejection of any sort, be it romantic or otherwise, it can be all too easy to start viewing ourselves as nothing more than collateral damage of our broken relationships. When love dies or breaks down or goes up in flames, it can be really hard to keep a grip on objectivity about ourselves. It seems like most of us go in one of three directions; some of us keep our chins up and press on, refusing to deal with and heal from our very real grief. Some of us, on the other hand, might start identifying as fundamentally broken or worthless, because we feel unchosen, unseen, or unloved. Some of us do both, our emotional health imploding silently as we walk around with our chins raised as high as possible. "I'm unlovable," says our subconscious mind, "and I will never let anyone see that I feel that way." The problem is, that never actually works. People see it, or feel it. We can't make ourselves islands, no matter what we do.
Most of us aren't ever shown how to heal well—how to admit our failures in a relationship and grow, but still avoid the pitfalls of shame. Shame says 'you're not beautiful' or 'you're worthless' — too much of the time, we begin to agree. Most of us just feel powerless and unlovable…we feel like collateral damage of those who may have hurt us, or of relationships that simply didn't last. So it’s good to ask ourselves this question honestly—‘collateral damage—is that all I am?’
If we go down deep enough, if we sort through the rubble and refuse from whatever has broken our hearts, I think we will find the answer to be ‘no.’ You are worthy of love. Don’t let shame or heartbreak tell you otherwise.
If you need an anthem for this process we are happy to oblige. :) https://soundcloud.com/levvmusic/collateral-damage