Broken

This morning I read a devotional by Ann Voskamp and came across this thought:

"Never be afraid of being a broken thing...unless a seed breaks, there is no life."

I have two initial reactions to this:

The first is encouragement, because I feel so broken. I so badly want life to come from this brokenness, and I want to be comforted by believing it will come. But the second reaction is bigger and is exactly the opposite: discouragement, because I feel so broken. There is a lot of fear surrounding that for me. It's so much easier to say something like "don't be afraid of being broken" if you're not broken, or if you were broken a long time ago. But if you're in the thick of it? When every single day feels like the waves are beating you against the rocks, but you can't escape and you can't drown? When your only option is just to feel it?

The small part of my heart that is capable of hope loves this idea. But my heart is still very much in the breaking process, and a large part of me feels like this statement belittles that in some ways. I want this break to result in life, I'm just not in a place where I can see that yet. One of the hardest things in the world for me has been hoping for something that I can't believe is true. Hoping for life and healing when all evidence is to the contrary, when all I feel is pain and anger and grief. And I find myself wondering, what good has getting my hopes up ever done me anyway?

My perspective on this flips constantly. This is far and away the hardest thing I've ever done. I've never hurt this badly. Pessimism and hopelessness are so easy, and they're comfortable. Familiar. I am grieving, heartbroken, and angry all at once. There is absolutely no pattern or system, so I never know how I'm going to wake up feeling, or when it's going to change, or when something will trigger some random memory or realization to add to the giant pile of things I'm having to process. I never knew it was possible to feel and believe two (or more) completely opposing emotions at the same time. Let me tell you, it absolutely is. Most of the time I feel completely crazy.

But there are glimmers of hope. When I feel discouraged, and when I think about how impossible this all seems, and when I don't feel like I'm strong enough, I remember that I am doing this thing that feels impossible. I've been doing it for months now. Has it been pretty? Not even close. Have I done and said things I regret? Absolutely. But I am stumbling, tripping, falling, and crawling my way through this the only way I know how. One minute at a time. I'm stronger now than I was in August. Knowing that is encouraging, but also exhausting, because I still have a long way to go. But I'm doing it.

When I think about a seed breaking and a sprout forcing it's way out of that hard shell, I think there's no way that wouldn't be painful. Probably unbearable, actually, if plants felt pain. But the process is necessary and the result is worth it.

And I so desperately hope that's true for me too.