We were walking along the ocean enjoying the blissful summer day when I looked up and saw a girl sitting on the edge of the water holding her cast out of the water. For a moment, I felt bad for her and then I paused and really reflected. She didn’t look upset, infact she looked like she was truly enjoying herself. I watched her as we walked up the shoreline of the ocean getting closer and closer to her.
Before I realized it, I was lost somewhere between worlds engaging with spirit. Isn’t it beautiful how this girl was able to realize that just because she is healing, just because part of her has been broken that it shouldn’t hold her back. It shouldn’t stop her from going to the ocean. It shouldn’t stop her from enjoying the sun. It shouldn’t stop her from enjoying the ocean water. It shouldn’t stop her from enjoying the salty breezy air. It shouldn’t stop her. It was a message that I loved very deeply. Just because we feel broken (and sometimes we really are!) and just because we are healing that broken place in ourselves doesn’t mean that we can’t enjoy every bit of what this life has to offer us. Maybe it will look different today than it will in a couple of months as we have healed more, but it doesn’t need to stop us. We can all find a way to experience the absolute bliss that life has to offer us, even when we are healing from a broken arm, or heart or whatever we broke.
I watched as a couple of her friends came out of the ocean waves and sat down next to her on the edge of the water and then it hit me. What if the broken arm allowed her to experience the ocean and the shoreline in a way that she wouldn’t have gotten to experience without the broken arm? What if these “broken” parts of us are simply a way to help us experience different parts of life in a way that we may not otherwise experience? What if we stopped using the work broken and stopped looking at it as just a way of experiencing being human differently than we otherwise would?