Here we go.  I am going to call you out.  You may not want to hear it, but sometimes, there are just some things we need to hear.

Yes, we are going to go there.

One of the scariest things we can ever do is to show pieces of ourselves to people who might take those pieces and toss them aside, pretend they don’t matter, or shatter them entirely.

This wanting to be open only if we feel safe leaves us in a state of turmoil…when to take our hearts with us or when we can leave it exposed?

For years, I hid.  I built walls.  Pretty good ones, I might add.  Some of them were nearly impossible to break down.  In fact, some might have been a pretty good fortress in times of war.

But you know what?

That takes a lot of effort and upkeep.  It was wearing on me, but I didn’t know it.  I was in constant battle mode.

Being honest with yourself is tricky and hard.

People worry about “keeping the peace” with others, but then soon realize that they sacrifice their own happiness by doing so.

What are we to do?  Either we give someone permission to possibly break our hearts or we do it to ourselves.

For many of us, letting that responsibility fall into the wrong hands seems almost too much to bear so we never let it get into any hands.

But how do we know which ones are the right hands and which ones are the wrong ones?

We only know once we share pieces of our heart with others and from then on, we either learn to stop all together or to give someone a little bit more to see what they do with it.

I get it.  We all know what it is like to feel betrayed by someone we once trusted.  It happens.  Unfortunately, it is a fact of life.  Just like the young child that is told over and over not to touch the stove because it’s hot, we find the need to still “find out for ourselves.”

And we begin to ask, “At what cost am I willing to risk getting hurt?”

Many of us come to the conclusion that the price is just too much to pay. It becomes something not worth it and we shy away from the opportunities where we can maybe give it another try with someone new.

That works for you.

It worked for me.

Am I telling you something you don’t already know?  No.

However, I am going to remind you of something that you have perhaps forgotten or don’t even realize…none of us are the same.  You cannot prejudge people based on the behavior of others.

At some point, you have to believe in someone again.  You have to learn to trust them and share pieces of yourself with the rest of the world.

What will it take for you to take that leap of faith?  When will you finally stop running away?  

I read an article once where hospice nurses asked their patients what they regretted most about the life they had lived and one of the top five answers was related to being more courageous — whether that meant chasing a dream, telling people how they felt about them, or something else that mattered.

Can you relate?  Is this you?  Even if you aren’t fighting some horrible disease, we can still want things to be different. To change.  To trust again.  To feel alive.

It takes pushing past the fear and believing in someone again in order for you to not being afraid.

Life is short.  Too short.  Don’t waste it behind walls being afraid.  That’s just not living.

And you know it.

Michelle A. Homme