“Brokenness is the operative issue of our time – broken souls, broken hearts, broken places.” – Samantha Power

“The world breaks everyone….and afterward many are strong at the broken places.” – Ernst Hemingway from his novel “A Farwell to Arms”

“In the broken places, the light shines through.” – Leonard Cohen

Ernst Hemingway said it best: The world breaks everyone.

They say time heals all wounds, but sometimes all it takes is a difficult dream that keeps you up all night and a set of circumstances the following day to tear a fragile heart to pieces once again.  Harder yet is a mind weighed down by thoughts too heavy and too deep to carry around.   It’s a broken place I have been before – one I thought I left behind.

Why is it that broken places have a way of calling us back to them?  What is it about our humanity that causes us to effortlessly drift back – allowing them to invade our thoughts so clearly and our hearts so easily again?

It seems like when this happens to me, I tend to relive the hurt, linger in the memories, and fall prisoner to the words and actions that inflicted the fracture in the first place.  I FEEL all those emotions so intensely and then try desperately to mentally run from that broken place as fast as I can!  But it feels like my mind is running in cement, like my heart is stuck in a thorny thicket – making it impossible to escape.

Can you relate to this my friend?  Like me, what broken places do you have that you seem to keep revisiting – not in a purposeful way, but in a way that relives the hurt, the pain and the suffering?

Is your broken place a death that has left a lasting void?  Is it a relationship that ended with no closure?  Is it a place where the addiction and its effects still linger or a space in time where all your wealth and security disappeared?

Was it a difficult day in the doctor’s office or the lonely weeks or months that passed without hearing from a child, a family member or a loved one?  Maybe it’s a place where the abuse occurred, the final argument or fight broke out, or the instance where the embarrassment and the shame began?

We seem to keep going back to these broken places mentally and emotionally time after time – just long enough to reminisce in the brokenness, to linger in the hurt, and to replay the exact moments where they changed our lives.

But here is something to think about my friend – something I intend to do with far more frequency and with greater determination when it comes to my broken places.

No longer will I wallow on the surfaces of them or feebly attempt to run from them.  This time, I am determined to plant myself right smack in the middle of them!  In fact, before I visit these broken places in my life again, I’m packing a bag that is filled with keen observation, sharp analytical skills, sound reasoning, and a prayer book filled with requests for God’s wisdom and clarity.

I don’t intend on just staying long enough to feel the hurt or replay the painful memories.  I’m going to camp out, dig in, and make myself at home in them until I become STRONG in that broken place as Hemingway suggests – focusing on the light that is shining through the break or crack as Mr. Cohen mentions above.

You see…. the relationship that dissolved has shed light on the people who remain – the character traits those people possess.  When I look at it hard, through the pain, I begin to see what looked like a tragedy was really a blessing in disguise.

Maybe the broken place of death has given you a renewed vigor for life and an appreciation for the blessed time you had together.  Has the abuse made you more compassionate and sensitive to the needs of others?  Has the financial ruin taught you what is truly valuable again?  Have you seen the light that is shining through the brokenness of addiction or the ray of hope that is glimmering through the broken place of abandonment?

If you don’t shy away from the broken places in your life – if you sit in the middle of them and intently observe all that surrounds them my friend – you will realize you are stronger for them.  You will see the light that shines through the brokenness 😊

Maybe that is why God has created us with the propensity to revisit them – to help us see how much we have grown because of their presence in our lives.  Maybe that is why He allows the broken places in the first place 😊

“Where once there were thorns, cypress trees will grow. Where nettles grew, myrtles will sprout up. These events will bring great honor to the LORD’s name; they will be an everlasting sign of his power and love.”  – Isaiah 55:13 NLT

God bless!