It starts out a day like any other. Everything is on track until a bombshell turns your world upside down. Everything is good and beautiful until the news poisons the mirage. Everything is going well—until all of a sudden, it’s not.

I remember thinking that the day I laid down flat upon my living room floor was the weakest moment of my life. Standing tall felt like an insurmountable task. I wanted the floor to absorb me. I could feel the spaces between the warped wooden slats embossing themselves into my back. They were sharp and soft at the same time. I wished I knew how to be soft yet strong, too.

I did not know it then, did not know it until many months or even a couple of years later; in my weakest moment, I was the most strong. Out of my most fragile state, the broken pieces stitched themselves back together from fibers of heartache and steel.

You see, when you feel like your world is ending; when you feel like you are shattered beyond repair and that you will never be okay again; this is where the magic happens.

It is only in your most honest moments, it is only when you feel utterly exposed, it is only when you are stripped bare of everyone and everything that has comprised the construct of who you are, that you can truly transform. Observe, learn, grow. You are the only one who can unbreak yourself. It is out of the ashes that your strongest self emerges bright with resolve.

Weak? You were never weak. To be raw is real. To be open is to be courageous. To be vulnerable is to be brave. You turned out to be stronger than you ever could have imagined. Your heart is a garden, and within it blooms strength.