I’ll show you my heart but it’s not pretty.

I’ve been trying to understand my heart, its defenses and masks, its motives and desires,

Trying to decide if pain has shut it off and made it cold,

Or if pain has broken and bruised my heart so much,

That I love the wrong people too much in a desperate attempt to heal.

I tried to be heartless, to not give a fuck, to inspire love and take and use and destroy without feeling a thing. 

I’m cynical and I say I don’t believe in love.

I say I don't care.

I’d die before I’d admit that any man had the power to hurt me.

But in reality I'm broken inside. 

My heart has been broken in so many ways, I still feel the ragged pieces, cutting through me from inside. 

So many fucked up things have been done to me in the name of "love", I don't even know what love is anymore. 

I poured out my love to so many people, desperately trying to find someone who would love me back, but I never did. 

I never did because I was looking for love to fix my brokenness, to put the pieces of me back together.

I was looking for something that would take away the pain and validate my love. 

I loved selfishly. 

But I don’t need anyone else’s love to heal me, no one else can make me whole. 

I am loving myself, and my love is enough. 

I may still be broken, I may still have ragged edges, but that’s ok, and once my love is enough, I can love others without needing them to fill me. 

I can love fearlessly, because even though I might get hurt, I will never be destroyed by another person as long as my confidence, worth, peace, and love come from within. 

So yes, I've been hurt, yes I've been weak, yes I've been desperate and needy. 

I'm not pretending I don't have a heart anymore. 

I have a heart and it’s not perfect, it’s not pretty, 
It has its shadows and faults, bruises and weaknesses.

But it’s going to love selflessly and fearlessly, and find out what true love really is.

When we become experts at ignoring reality...

                                 


It’s so easy to pretend like we don’t know what’s going on in the world. It’s so easy to distance ourselves from other people’s pain. It’s so easy to shift blame and responsibility onto someone else.

It’s so easy for this country to see pictures of starving children in third world countries and then go right back to throwing away a third of our food. It’s so easy to say we love animals and get upset about abandoned puppies and then turn around and eat meat from an innocent animal that was slaughtered more horribly than we could imagine. It’s so easy to ignore the fact that sex trafficking isn’t just an issue in Thailand and India, but that girls are getting used, abused, and killed right here in our cities and towns and neighborhoods.

Most of us our so comfortable and sheltered from the raw harsh reality of the world around us that even when we catch a glimpse of it we want to pretend it’s not there. Or we post some heated words on facebook or donate to a charity and think we’ve done our part and can move on and forget about it.

I have been on the other side. I have been the less-than-human junkie living on the street that everyone wanted to ignore. No one wanted my pain and brokenness to intrude on their safe, happy little world. And that’s just the problem: our society has created two worlds. One is the world we see portrayed in Hollywood, the white picket fence, successful businessman, American dream world where everyone complains about everything while even the poorest of them have more money, food, and luxuries than the rest of the population combined.

The other world is the underbelly, the world that exists in rotting trap houses and dark alleyways, the world where stability and safety are non-existent, the world where basic human rights are violated daily. The world where having a roof over your head is a luxury and food for the day is a blessing. The world where you can’t trust anyone, not even the police, and every day is a fight for survival.

We seem to think we could fix things by pulling everyone from the second world into the first world. But what we fail to see is that there are not two worlds. We are all part of the same world. We are all human beings. The CEO is no different than the homeless man outside his office building, and just a few adverse life circumstances could land him in the exact same position. By ignoring this and ignoring the blatant corruption and suffering around us, we are actively contributing to the problem. The person who stands by and watches abuse happen is just as guilty as the abuser.

Change starts with you. Change starts when you begin to see people and treat people differently. Change starts when you stop projecting what you want reality to be onto everything around you and become willing to see the world as it truly is. Change starts when you stop numbing and desensitizing yourself to the cruelty and suffering of others and begin to have compassion for every living thing.

Change starts when you stop thinking that what you do or don’t do doesn’t make a difference and you start taking responsibility for how your actions affect everyone and everything around you. Change starts when you stop living for your own comfort and start thinking of others. Change starts when you stop assuming someone else will do something someday and you become that someone who is doing something right now.

All the things I wish I could tell you.

     There burns inside of me a light and energy that I wanted so badly to translate into words so I could share it with others. I get so excited by the things I’m learning and so awestruck by the things I’ve seen that I want to shout them from the rooftops and tell the whole world what an incredible universe we’re living in. I am so grateful to have been awoken from the nightmare of half-consciousness I was living in that I want to wake everyone else up. My joy and excitement about existence is overflowing and I don’t want to experience it by myself.

     I want to be able to paint a picture of the world, a picture of life, that’s as vibrant and mind-blowing and intricately simple as I feel it to be. I want to be able to tell people things in a way that will make them understand it in their heart. To tell them that everything happens for a reason and for them to be filled with the same peace and confidence I get from knowing that. To tell them that they are perfectly loved and nothing they do can change that, and for them to then stop living in fear of rules and of making a mistake. To tell them that there is so much more to this world than what they experience with their five senses, and for their consciousness to be expanded to experience the great spectrum of existence. To tell them that we make life much more difficult and complicated than it has to be, and for them to see how simple are the natural laws of attraction and karma.

     I want to tell them that we exist so far beyond this life and for them to stop living for momentary satisfaction but do the things that will benefit them long-term.

     I wish I could show them how meaningless are money, power, careers, social status, and material possessions, and that the meaning of life is to spread love and hope and truth. I wish I could explain that everything is energy, that happiness is a choice, that suffering is our greatest spiritual teacher, that time and space are an illusion, that we are the universe discovering itself. I wish I had the words to express the beauty I find in pain and darkness, the perfection of the plan being unfolded, the timelessness of the story we are telling with our lives.

     I long to find a way to communicate the fire that woke me up. I want to wake everyone up out of the fog of fear and suffering. I want to verbalize the Truth.

     But I can’t. I can’t wake up anyone who is not ready to wake up, I can’t make anyone see what they are not ready to see. It took experiencing darkness for me to find the light. And I would be arrogant to think that I can verbalize Truth and wake others when I am still waking up myself. I have barely begun to crack open the book of all there is to know. I am still learning and I just want to learn alongside others. All I can do is speak my heart through both words and actions, and people will understand or they won’t.

     In any case, perhaps some things are not meant to be spoken, at least not by me. Some things can only be felt. Some things we just know and understand although we can’t speak about them.

     Everyone is on their own path of learning and the teacher is experience. Experience lets us feel those things we cannot speak, the things we cannot learn from a book or by someone else telling us.

     So all I can say is embrace experience. Experience as much as you can. In time we learn to listen to that voice inside of us that doesn’t have to use words to convey Truth. Listen. Learn. Ask questions. Pay attention.

     There is so much out there to discover. Seek and you shall find. Open your heart and mind and let yourself be swept away by the whirlwind of experience.

Nobody.

“I’m sick of not having the courage to be an absolute nobody.” (elephantjournal)

   I’ve always struggled with comparing myself to other people and feeling inferior. I get insecure and lonely and want someone to give me attention and tell me I’m good enough. But I’m not brave enough to be myself and ask for what I want. I’m quiet, reserved, and generally come across as independent (I don’t want anyone to think I need them). So when I see other people who are louder, more confident, or needier, getting attention, I start thinking that maybe I need to change. Maybe if I was more like this person I would have guys asking me out on dates, or if I was more like that person I would always get what I want. I start to feel overshadowed, outshone, by everyone around me. I must have to burn brighter, louder, hotter, than everyone to get that attention and affirmation.

   But how incredibly shallow is that. I’m embarrassed to admit that I’ve felt that way. But I think everyone has been there at some point, and I can’t move past it unless I talk about it.

   I can tell you that true connection is so much more than just the physical and surface level interactions, and the right people will appreciate you for exactly who you are. But ultimately we don’t need anyone to appreciate us to be perfectly ok with who we are.

   I am learning to be alone and be ok with that, knowing that all the love and affirmation I need comes from someplace within me, not from without. I am learning to be truly independent and not care what people think. I am learning to be my true self and not put on masks or try to be anything I’m not. I am learning to have the courage to be an “absolute nobody”: I will be myself and not give a shit if I’m a somebody or a nobody to anyone.

“Stop judging and evaluating yourself, for this is not your role. Above all stop comparing yourself with other people. This produces feelings of pride or inferiority, sometimes a mixture of both. [God] leads [His] children along a path that is uniquely tailor-made for him or her. Comparing is not only wrong; it is also meaningless. Don’t look for affirmation in the wrong places: your own evaluations or those of other people. The only source of real affirmation is [God’s] unconditional Love.”

(Jesus Calling)

   Have respect and appreciation for who you are, for who God created you to be. You wouldn’t be here if the Universe didn’t need you. It needs you to be fundamentally, unapologetically you. Let go of fear and judgments and preconceived ideas of who you should be. Be openminded. Take the time to be alone and discover who you truly are. Relax. Exist. 

Freedom.

I’ve always gone it alone,
It’s just easier that way,
And safer because people
Had always betrayed.
I was tired of being weak,
Of the lies and abuse,
I couldn’t stand up for myself
And people put that to use.
So with stone cold walls
I surrounded my heart,
If no one could get in
They couldn’t tear me apart.
I was constantly running,
Never stayed in one place,
Had to get somewhere new
And old memories erase.
Couldn’t risk getting attached,
I’d been hurt so much before,
After too many breaks,
The heart can’t take any more.

But I’d built myself a prison,
Locked myself in a cage,
With walls of self-pity,
Arrogance, and rage.
I was drowning in pain,
Under wave after wave,
The water kept rising,
It made me its slave.
I couldn’t get out
So I turned inward instead,
I destroyed myself
To stop the agony in my head.
I ran away to the streets,
Shot dope to forget,
But the misery now
Was the worst I’d felt yet.
I tore myself apart,
The only way I could cope,
I hurled myself gladly
Down that slippery slope.
I was totally alone,
No one else caused me pain,
I’d reached my goal,
And I was going insane.
Still locked in my prison,
I thought I was free,
But the worst kind of cage
Is the one you can’t see.

But God opened my eyes,
Sprung the lock on my cell,
Reached down and grabbed me
From the dark depths of Hell.
A train off its tracks
Is free in a way,
But can’t go anywhere,
In one place it stays.
I realized true freedom
Is not running away,
From God, from karma,
And just making my own way.
True freedom is found
When I stop fighting control,
And follow my gut,
Body, mind, and soul.
No one else can take
Away all my pain,
No one else can hurt me
Or make me truly happy again.
External factors
No longer control things,
My peace and my strength
Come from just being.