The Art of Falling Apart

I fell apart, slowly and then all at once. It was over a period of years that turned to months, months that turned to days and days that turned to hours. I deteriorated from the outside in, eroding bit by bit, until I was unrecognizable to myself.

Eventually I was left empty, no longer egocentric yet void of a recognizable soul. My thoughts became cloudy and the unreciprocated affection that I had ceaselessly bestowed escaped me. I stood wide-eyed and watched as old bridges burned. I was completely engulfed in the flames yet I stood stoic and removed. The reflection of fire in my eyes was the only light left inside of me. I didn’t flee, but I didn’t offer solace to those on the other side of the fiery channels. I fought my instinct to hold on to those people.

I wasn’t quite sure why at the time but I knew they no longer served me. If that sounds heartless it’s because it was. I fully lost heart before I began to gain pieces of it back. I knew the naked truth and it was that I was alone; this was my walk and my reaping.

Still there was a subtle vibration that started in my gut and pulsed through my veins. Pump, pump, pump, the quiet but steady beating of a hidden heart's resurrection.

The pain of growth was the only thing that caused me to believe in my sanity. It was the one thing that gave me courage in my conviction that it was right to walk away. The inner verities I’d masked for so long grew, louder and louder, angry they had gone ignored for so long. I wanted it all to stop because it seemed too much to stomach.

I wasn’t ready to live up to the potential that I harbored within myself. It was buried down in depths that were foreign and unknown to me, and the journey to the other side seemed too perilous. The thought of discovering my true self was both terrifying and paralyzing.

I tried to quench this enigmatic light with gilded things of this world. But the light struck back with more force the harder I tried to mask it. Nights of revelry that I’d once relished in now seemed dull and unmoving. Tall buildings and luxurious houses that I'd once viewed as the dazzling effect of money and power now came across as fake and flimsy.

Fast-forward six months and my head and my heart are no longer paralyzed. My mind now wanders, every day, countless times.

Sometimes, after a plentiful night’s sleep, my body feels rested but my mind feels so drained it aches. It’s as if I’ve been traveling through the night, talking with strangers and wandering in and out of dwellings unknown to my waking self. I don’t need to physically see the midnight journeys to know that I’ve walked them. I imagine myself in dimly lit rooms, whispering into unfamiliar ears and laughing at the fact that people have yet to discover the meaning of life.

There’s no direction, rhyme, or reason, but my thought patterns have now shifted. I am nomadic, no longer rooted and no longer hanging on to a false sense of security. During those nights when I’m traveling I’m no longer afraid that my life will be forever empty of grandeur. I don’t dull myself to fit into a world of impossible expectations. I don’t numb myself to pacify the fact that my life will never be what I dared to dream it could be when I was curly-headed scoundrel. I am bold and daring. I am alive and waking. I am ready to ask of life all that I know I'm deserving of.

And when my higher self feels that I’m ready, I get glimpses of what this looks like in my waking life. I no longer feel a desire to live a life that is clean and tidy. I no longer feel satisfied confining my love to a select few who are undeserving of it. I no longer feel it necessary to avow in vain my self-worth to deaf ears. I want to get loud and messy. I want to take the rekindled flame in my heart and paint love on anyone and everyone.

I can’t yet manifest all that drives my inner fire into a tangible form and at times I am blank to the point of frustration. But still, I know that I’m coming back together. I’m falling into place in the same fashion I fell apart, but inversely. All at once, and then slowly. Hours turning to days, days turning to months and months turning to years. Building bit by bit, a recognizable truth branded into my soul and burned into my heart. A truth as old as time that sweetly murmurs to me in moments of utter silence: the light within always wins, no exceptions.