Healing Comes In Waves, So Keep Swimming

Whoever said that healing is not linear makes an excellent point. Sometimes it takes one step backward to take another two forward. There is no formula that if you abide and apply, you are guaranteed to feel okay. In fact, there is no phenomenal split second where you think you’re “completely healed” because on a much deeper level, healing is more than just fixing what is broken. Life is all about cycles. We experience birth, death, rebirth in subtle yet different ways every day. As long as we are breathing and we are not resistant to change, we are healing. We have the capacity to change, therefore we have the ability to be better. Every day we acquire and experience new things, so it is essential to let it all go and heal every single day.

Healing is much like remembering—remembering who you truly are. It’s a process of knowing yourself in ways you’ve never before. It does not need to feel and look perfect, because it isn’t. Healing is surrendering to the unknown. Nobody knows how it will unfold. Healing is uncertain, unpredictable, and uncomfortable. But it also is a choice, your own personal will to keep doing it and holding on even when it remains to be messy and difficult.

Healing is different for everybody. Sometimes there are cries that only you need to witness. There are heartbreaks that only you have to experience and know about. There are nights that you have to spend alone. There are moments that you need to be on your own. Oftentimes, in these moments, you may feel weak. You may feel like your whole world has fallen apart, and you might even feel the need to call for help. But the truth is, in these times, you will learn how to stand up for yourself. You will learn how to choose yourself. Moments of weakness are moments of strength in disguise when you make that choice to keep going. In silence, you hear answers. You hear answers when you spend time in solitude—when you tune in to yourself and pay attention to what your heart is saying. Everything else is just distraction.

Healing isn’t forgetting. It isn’t dodging or avoiding, nor is it suppressing. In fact, it is remembering. Sometimes it can mean feeling it over and over again until the wound is so open that it finally feels right to surrender to the pain. It is giving yourself another chance after countless ones to accept things as they are, even if you don’t approve of it. Even if you despise it. Even if you think it’s unfair.

Sometimes healing feels like submerging in an ocean. It’s so deep that you’re encouraged to find and swim great depths within your pain. The only way out is to dig deeper and first be immersed in your ocean of ache. And then slowly, carefully, you find your way to the surface. Suddenly you are that person with depth, finally being able to breathe and realizing that there is nothing you cannot overcome.

When you begin to gasp for air and take your very first breath again, you realize that what you’re fighting for is your life—the life in you. It must be worth it. It is worth it. There you are, breathing. And you have never been more alive.

“Simplify things” are the best two words put together. We hurt ourselves more when we resist what is happening in the present and deny what life is trying to teach us. When we are aware why we are hurting, we can begin to understand and give ourselves a chance to accept and open our hearts as to why things are happening the way they are. This life is truly a gift, and we have a choice to honor that gift by living authentically and giving it our best shot because healing is not a destination. It is our personal journey.